NfaN, Book 5: Shadowland
by KairiVenomus
Summary: After Kaos the Deadly was defeated, peace was once again given back to Ninjago- but it is not completely safe in a world where a sinister Lloyd is tainted by Devourer's venom. Five years later when Zane has a prophetic dream telling of a cure for his darkness, the ninja must collect all the long-lost ingredients before the full moon rises to save their friend. Will they succeed?
1. Preface

**Hello everyone. :) **

**Welcome to NfaN, Book 5: Shadowland. I know I promised this would come out on the 26th of September, but I decided that I was going to post a few days early, because...well, I miss NfaN a lot, and wanted to share what I'd created thus far with all of you. So I hope you dearly enjoy, and know in your hearts I am grateful for all of you. (And that I don't own Ninjago.) This entry is actually like a pre-logue (the baby that happens when you cross a preface and a prologue!) that talks a little about a past memory of the ninja. Enjoy! -Kairi**

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**Nightmares for a Ninja  
Book Five:  
SHADOWLAND  
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**A Premake of Sorts**

_"Prepare to eat my dust, because you guys are gonna get left behind!"_

_"In your dreams, Rocky! I'm going to mop the floor with you!"_

_"You are all very inaccurate. It is I who shall win this match!"_

_"All I gotta say is: Get ready to be Kai'd!"_

_The wind poured over their laughing faces, smiling into the oncoming wind without, seemingly, anything to give a sad dare over; however, in the bask of the quick sunlight glowing down upon their light skin, only of ages ranging from sixteen to eighteen at the time, the four boys had things that they could be busying themselves by stressing over. After all, there was the matter of the escaped Dark Lord to be dealing with, or perhaps the ideals to attempt and reach their true potential by several hours of masculine training, hard work, and complete focus. But even boys who determine themselves with their egos and the power of being adored by fangirls can become threatened by too much work in one day. Normally, that didn't bother Wu Garmadon—he was their Sensei, after all, and training them to become the best Ninja they could be was primarily his main focus. But watching them from the porch as in the sky overhead, they battled each other on the backs of their elemental dragons, he knew that letting them blow off their pent-up antsiness would do them some good. When in a particular mode, each of his four beloved students dialed their strengths to the greatest function their bodies could perform; they wielded even their weaknesses to the better of their advantage. They were all pointed in the direction of success, and each of them easily mattered themselves with keeping their minds fixed on the task at hand. But, as Wu knew from being a young boy once himself—that was many years in his past now—there was always the need for a little break. He offered them, after a long morning with training that seemed to extend its arm outwards towards defeating the missing Dark Lord and divided family member to Wu, Lord Garmadon, an afternoon of relaxation—or, he supposed, in their minds, time to goof around._

_Each of them were to be considered "almost fully grown men," but that seemed not to matter. They all acted rowdy, rambunctious, and raucous: The three feared R's of a caregiver's life. Children often went through their "Terrible Two's," but these boys went through the "Three Wearisome R's" faster and more obnoxiously than any pack of children that Wu had ever known. He supposed it was due to the fact that they were all in a centralized, closed space where they were only surrounded by men; when speaking to each of them beforehand on a more relaxed note in the darkness of the fallen night, after treating themselves to a wonderful dinner, Wu had asked them how their lives had been before he'd found them. Of course, Wu had already known the big picture. He was more interested in the small details he had not yet worked out. He wanted to know if they attended school, what home life was like, things to that effect. Treating them as if he were akin to each of them, Wu Garmadon had become somewhat attached to the students he'd been, under his own circumstance, forced to abode with for however many a day it was since picking them up off the curb and helping them prepare their wings to fly._

_His eldest student of eighteen, Cole Mitsuhide, was the one who needed that sort of fatherly help the most. When Wu had come upon him in a rather unintentional fashion—Wu had not known, when he found Cole, exactly what he himself was looking for, and in a way, they both helped each other figure that out before the other three became firm to the photograph—Cole had lacked purpose and direction. He was a kind wanderer, a truant, and a destitute child living upon the land, trying to evade the destiny his father had painted before him in his own personal wishes for his son. He hadn't known where he was going, what he wanted to do with his life, or who he really was. Asking himself a thousand times, "Who am I?" never directly got an answer until the two men, one young and another old, finally met face to face. Now, it seemed Cole had a little more than just a pinky on the reigns of life's wild course. He knew more, he was a little smarter, a little stronger, stood a little taller. From the eyes of a teacher, Wu saw Cole blossom from a shriveled, quiet runaway into a strong, loyal, protective leader who would give anything for the other three younger boys he called his brothers. Cole was intuitive, observant, and naturally quiet, (up until he was forced to be brought out of his shell by living with three other boys somewhat congruent to his age) but he was also strong-voiced, serious, faithful to his friends, and more than that, he was determined to make a change. He was the ideal student to every teacher. Wu was proud of him for becoming such a well-trained boy._

_Cole, however, was polar opposites with the second student that Wu had come across when he realized what his next direction in tactics was. While Cole had a hard time figuring out how he was supposed to fix the toaster when it over-wired itself on bad mornings, Wu's most lacking student in the art of seriousness was better at tinkering with electronics than he believed anyone he knew was. Jay Walker, the second of his pupils, was all for the jokes, the laughter, and the lighthearted banter rather than the artistic drawing and reading that Cole had once surrounded himself with. Jay's ideal "day off" afternoon, before he lived with Wu and Cole, was poring over blueprints, sketching up ideas, and calculating math equations faster than any human being in current existence. Welding, twisting with screwdrivers, nailing in with hammers, and fastening with power drills kept his evenings filled with inventions, crazy ideas that never worked. But no matter how many failures his creations may tally up to, Jay would never stop dreaming. His imagination ran wild. He was creative beyond any extent, with a heart bigger than Ninjago itself, with the extroverted personality that automatically either wrangled people closer or drove them away, depending on one's tastes in acquaintances. Be no brainiac, no ego to sour his lightweight mind that knew so much, Jay kept his heart wide for anyone—up until they gave him reason to shut the doors, that is. He smiled almost constantly, cracked jokes in the middle of training that got all of Wu's students giggling like schoolgirls, always trying to make somebody laugh, the identity of which recently had pertained to the young face of Nya Smith, a sister to one of Wu's Ninjas that had come to live with them. Down-to-earth, (less than normally) subtle, outburstive, yet ready for the fight that came to turn the switch inside of his heart. He may have been the joker of the group, but that never stopped the flamboyant boy from being serious and ready for a fight when it came to battling the enemy. He was always on his toes, prepared (the majority of the time) for anything. His wit often helped distract the enemy in war using loud comments and quips to take their mind off things._

_Yet again very different from the third (and youngest) student of Wu's, who preferred silence, calculation, numbers, lots of books, poems, reading, silence, cooking, deep thought, dancing animals, and silence. Most of the time when it came to training these boys in the best of the abilities that Wu's father had educated him into being able to use one day, the noise centered around one, two, and four but evaded three. Sound hardly ever came from his introverted apprentice, Zane Montgomery, unless he was directly asked a question. Though Zane was eager to learn, ready for the day before anyone else was, able to participate in lessons without becoming nervous, Wu was already hyperaware of Zane's inner differences from the other boys that set him apart from them on a level that no one could truly obtain. The sensei had suspected many reasons for this, concluding efficiently only to a few theories (one of which he'd already proven): that Zane was a definite introvert, had autism, or wasn't entirely human. Wu had, come many times, pulled Zane aside to ask him questions that weren't too direct of his suspicions—Zane was very much oblivious to knowing that Wu was suspecting something deeper inside of him—and had gotten answers that were unsatisfactory to prove his thoughts. The only one Wu had been able to finalize was that Zane was an introvert to a T. No problem with that, however; he was fine with having attention paid to him, but did not prefer the spotlight being sectioned onto his being. His quiet tentativeness, accompanied by his exquisite knowledge of things even the wise sensei did not know of, proved that there was more to Zane than originally met the eye. He was smart, quick, quiet. He did not judge or complain, nor argue on a normal basis. His abilities as a Ninja were advanced with quick speed, agility, and grace, as came with the rest of his brothers. He kept to himself, but enjoyed being accepted, although Wu sometimes felt melancholy when he saw the other three giving Zane weird looks behind his back. Wu cared intensely for the poor boy. Zane was just a little different, that was all._

_Coming to finalize the descriptions, his fourth student was anything that had to do with "mainstream child," and completely different from everyone else's. His life, it seemed, was more ideal and perfect than that of the other four people he resided with. Generally loved by his peers, Kai Smith was popular to his school before graduating, was a member of the baseball team since he was young, already had fangirls before he became a Ninja, and enjoyed the attention, basking in it all the time. He had a comparatively large ego that inflated by the seconds. Kai was a "party boy," according to Jay's assessment of his new team member, back when they were first making introductions and slipping into "I'm-not-comfortable-with-you-yet-but-I'll-try" in the early stages of their Ninja training. His personality was acceptable enough for Wu to handle, and he had the qualities that one needed for a Fire Ninja to fully complete the title. Being that kind of Ninja had its downsides to the personality "disorders" (again, Jay's perception) he came packaged with: the impulsive decisions, the hotheaded anger that fueled the short temper. It also did come with great upsides, such as determination to fight to the end, which sometimes took itself to be mistaken for rough competitiveness, and obstinate reluctance to give up. Kai was literally the petrol that the pack of boys ran on, despite his background of being Mr. Popular and completely stray from the others. He completed Wu's crusade of Ninjas perfectly. Without him, they might not have the stamina to continue on. It appeared the "party boy" really did keep the flame lit._

_Each of them had their qualities that made them all unique. Wu cared deeply for all of them, dictating himself to be the broad uncle figures in their lives, since it was only Zane and Kai who lacked the fatherly figures they portrayed Wu as in their minds. He taught them basic life lessons that they would need not only for their preparation to become great Ninjas and hopefully one day Spinjitzu Masters, but also for a time after they grew up, started their own families, and became fathers themselves—things they would teach their sons and daughters, passing along Wu's wisdom, keeping the flames alive. That time when they would become young men seemed so far away, looking at them now…_

_"YOU'RE CHEATING!"_

_"No I'm not; there's absolutely no way to cheat in a game with no rules, Jay!"_

_"YOU'RE A DIRTY CHEATER, PARTY BOY! CHEAT-TOR! CHEAT-TOR!"_

_Okay; perhaps that time was farther away than Wu thought. He smiled into the air, glad the brim of his hat kept the sun out of his eyes, so he could watch while calmly drinking his tea and observing the exercise of the majestic beasts and the broadening of his students' hearts. Taking a sip of the warm Oolong tea, the steam rising into his nose, Sensei Wu Garmadon set looked to the sky, where opportunity, love, and yes, maturity would someday grow. _

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_**I am pretty much posting the first chapter right after this one. I hope you enjoyed the little flashback, and get ready for one bumpy ride when you begin reading NfaN Book 5: SHADOWLAND! Thanks for reading! And go have an AWESOME day/night! -Kairi**_


	2. 1: No Ninjas Allowed

**This chapter is a discussion of what you missed during the 5 years **that it has been since the defeat of Kyon/Kaos. :)

**PS- Point of view rules still apply from last book, only this time the "I" or 1st person point of view will typically be expressed by Lloyd.** I will tell you if it's a 1st person with Seiko narrating it.** (NOTE: Seiko becomes more of a minor character in this book.)**

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_1. No Ninjas Allowed_

The echoes of who I once was still ring in my ears.

Sometimes, it heavily holds down on my shoulders, keeping me pinned underneath their distant cries, like somehow the past me is trying to get ahold of the present, older me by a couple of shouts that only barely break the surface of the barrier dividing us: time. Many years divide he and I—the he of which was a young child that knew no hindrances to his life but the difficulties of fighting the truth, a kid stuck in the body of someone who was years ahead of him by accident. He fought the truth every day. Sometimes, it was a small fight over something insignificant, like the fight of truth that he would eventually have to wake up and face the daylight. Up until the recent days of his torture, he would have to spar with darkness that laid in many truths to the lie his life was. The lie of who _he _was. His past, his childhood memories, the truth of who he really was and the situations he was forced to endure all were, at some point, deemed a lie or revealed to be one; nothing could deter the world from spinning, with the way everyone kept grabbing the handle and turning it. Sometimes, he wondered if God was the one doing this on purpose. But God wouldn't be so cruel. God could only watch him suffer.

He is I, and I am he.

I don't fight the truth as much as I did when I was younger. I guess you could say I've accepted who I am more than I thought I could when every day a new secret was being told to me about who I really was. Back then, one day I would be someone, but the next, after being told otherwise, I suddenly was another person; I think I've outdone every single person I know by becoming at least four different people in such a short span of time. I've morphed myself in contortions that I didn't know my soul could handle being wrestled into, by goodness that kept me able to bend fittingly into the corner I painted myself in. I've done more things than your average person has—and speaking that way on a physical level, I'm talking. I have literally been to Hell and back. I've fought demons, punched Minotaurs, had an unusual dinner with the Prince of Darkness, been held captive, had my mind taken over to the point where half of my year was a total lie, thought that I could talk to a tattoo on the back of my hand, been _branded _supernaturally because of my status in the paranormal world, become the key part of a prophecy, met a faun, found out that I was a random soul stuck into the body of a dead child by accident, been told that my mother was a witch and then a robot before finally being told my "adopted" mother is actually my real mother, trained day and night to be a Ninja, been branded as a "hero," fought and defeated an evil Overlord, and the list stretches on forever. Let's just say my life hasn't always been exactly what you call _normal. _Until now, when everything is…for once…strangely ordinary. Sort of.

…

It's been four years since I last saw the group of friends that I had, beforehand, been comfortable with calling my brothers. My contacts with them, painfully to my surmise, have been severed since then—I don't even have their new phone numbers anymore. Every time I think about them, my chest starts to ache, my lungs stop working, and I have to take deep breaths just to ward off the sadness that I feel lumping in my throat. It doesn't hurt as much as it used to in the early stages after we parted ways, when living without them was something I had lost custom to understanding; every day would be a pain to try and figure out, for living with each of them, I had never been bored. Someone always had something to entertain us with. But with_out _them…there wasn't anything.

Shortly after the day we grieved the loss of several of our friends four and a half years ago, the same exact day that is counted as the last time I ever saw my best friend, everyone began the break-away process. Up until this point, I had felt it; the change in our friendships, I mean. We weren't close anymore. We weren't ourselves. We didn't have anything between us that initially kept us tied to one another, that kept us fearing splitting up in the time it had been since the Overlord died. After that incident, we procrastinated discussing what we were going to do from there and just continued living aboard the Destiny's Bounty that the now-deceased Dr. Julien had helped us repatch. We hadn't wanted to leave each other behind. But when we defeated Kyon, A.K.A. Kaos the Deadly, it had been totally opposite that. Everyone had been _eager _to leave. My best friend, Kai Smith, had left me only few days after we buried our dead, and since watching his back slowly shrink in the distance I haven't seen him. We used to talk over the phone, but his calls became slowly nonexistent on their own time accordance, taking intervals at a time between each period we spoke to each other until he stopped calling altogether. I told him, that day, not to take too long in "fixing" himself so I could see him again.

I never did.

It only took a month and a half for (some of) us, the noble band of Ninja that fought evil just for a detached continent placed on Earth where the small island of Rumenea used to be, to quickly pack our bags and leave behind the Monastery of Peace without so much as a backwards glance. Nobody was willing to stay long enough to sort out our ideas for the future, what it might hold for us, or even discuss our plans with the remainder of our once-so-exclusive friendship—everyone was less-than-excited to be staying in the same building, ready to move on with their lives. Getting why that is has always been an issue for me. Everyone, this time around, was so excited to leave, when before everyone was too scared to step foot outside the Bounty's walls. Was it because of all the stuff we've been through? Is it because of what we've become? Is it because we're just not friends anymore?

The first of us to leave, not counting Kai, was Cole Mitsuhide, the leader of our team. More than ready to move on, Cole wasted only three weeks dawdling in the bask of the Monastery of Peace's small comfort, his bags pre-packed for the first airline ticket he could purchase towards flying for the Marty Oppenheimer College for Performing Arts, located in faraway town called Hemison. His goodbye, in opposition to his quick runaway, was teary, heartfelt, and inclusive of lots of hugging. I remember feelings so numb to the idea that I was to lose another one of my friends. Cole and I never were close enough to spawn a call-once-a-week connection. He wouldn't call me, and I didn't have the strength to call him—we were broken at that point. Sorely broken.

I know that Jay Walker was crying alongside Nya Smith, like they never were going to see Cole again or something, even though to my knowledge it was Nya who told Cole to go to the college and earn a degree, so he could get a job he really wanted. I knew Cole would have a better tendency to see them—but only because of his month-old daughter, Rie Tanaka, and the custody that Nya unspokenly had over her.

Zane Montgomery bawled his eyes out and clung to Cole, begging him not to leave in a child's squeal that was similar to Zane's childish personality, until Cole threatened to never call him on the weekends. I remember Zane had looked miserable to the thought, let him go, but kept a grasp on the sleeve of Cole's jacket until it was time for him to go. Zane seemed the most affected by Cole's leaving. His eyes had stayed red all day long.

Cole had said goodbye to Seiko with a quiet hug that had no spoken words. There must've been some sort of mentally said things that they weren't going to tell each other with voice—I knew the Mitsuhide siblings to be better at speaking to each other when there was nothing to be said. In her trying-not-to-be-sad Seiko way of boycotting, she clung to her brother, her face buried in his shoulder to push back the tears, and her older body so much more changed in his arms. He held her close, and whispered something to her I didn't hear. Kissed her on the cheek, let her go, and said goodbye to the three-week-old Bokuyo. Said goodbye to everyone one last time.

And then he was gone.

I don't know how much longer it was before Jay and Nya set me and Zane down to tell us they wanted to move out, sitting on the couch in the monastery's living room side by side and allowing Zane and I, paused in our game of checkers, to look up at the two of them, who looked pretty close to a couple of parents telling their kid they were going to have another baby. Thighs pressed together, Nya's hand curled around Jay's in his lap—it looked too much like a scene out of a movie to be real. But it was real enough. They wanted to move to West Ignacia so Nya could be close to her living immediate family, her old friends, _and _Kai by about a mile. They were ready to start their lives. Zane and I had looked at each other over the checker board, exchanged glances briefly, before Zane burst into tears. "Why am I _losing _everybody?" He'd cried, as a startled Jay and Nya tried to calm him down from his sobbing. I remember thinking: _I'm wondering the same thing, too, buddy, but I already know the answer to it._

We'd been more prepared for it when they moved out, taking Rie with them. Zane and I had stood at the top of the monastery steps, waving at them as they and a couple robots under the names Ming and Rikku and some other dude helped them carry out the last of their few belongings into a car at the bottom, waiting to carry them away from us forever.

Lou Mitsuhide had already moved out when Cole had left, finding no reason to stay, much to Seiko's relief. Ed and Edna Walker decided they'd head back to the junkyard, but promised Seiko they'd babysit any time she wanted them to, giving her strangely long hugs before I helped them move out _their _little belongings. I think they'd grown on the hard-shelled Seiko. (She would never admit that.) Misako and Damon Garmadon, my parents, stayed at the monastery with us and my robot uncle, Wu, up until my mother received a phone call about paying the bills for their house, after which reminded them that they _did _have a house to live in. I had already gone through my "eighteenth" birthday (My mom stuck 12 candles on my cake instead of 18) and assured my parents I'd be fine living at the monastery with Uncle Wu. That whole process took forever to finally get my parents to move back into their house.

At that point, I was living with Zane, Sensei Wu, Rikku and Ming Montgomery, Bokuyo, Seiko, and Yuki Akamatsu, the friendly healer who stayed at the monastery. The faun that Zane's Bizarro had begged us to take, Jeriminé, had escaped late one night, never to return; probably to move on with her life, somehow, to some extent of not being cooped up in Pandemonium Bastion anymore. I had spent my nights playing checkers against one of the Montgomery trio, losing every single match to their witty brilliance, only sharpening my own skills at the game to _almost _win every time until they overtook me with a secret move I was dying to capture. I fell for it every time. During the days, I had hung around with Sensei Wu, listened to Bokuyo scream and throw fits at Seiko, made the phone calls to Edna for Seiko to ask for parenting advice that Seiko was too stubborn to ask for, prodded around with Zane when Rikku didn't feel like playing big brother, tried to get used to Yuki and failed miserably because of his unwillingness to be social, and grew affectionate for the little kid that Seiko had a hard time looking at. My fondness for the little child whom I had known before as a 7 year old that looked creepily like me thrived. He was a cute little kid, and when he first smiled, it was pretty neat to see. He was smiling at Zane, I think, because that day Zane and I had been watching him while Seiko ran to go find his pacifier. Zane had been making funny faces for him while I held him, back against my chest, sitting on my legs, gently bouncing him to make a hopefully sleepy motion. The cries had turned into laughter. When Seiko finally got back, his fit was over.

In a way, I think I treated Bokuyo, at the time, like he was my own little brother, the one that I never had. I played with him using the little toddler toys that were stupid but entertained children from some odd vanishing point I never saw, like the dinky stuffed animals that weren't made with cotton but some annoying crinkly fabric, and the building blocks with letters on them. When Seiko finally took to the investment that she would start spending a little bit of the "dowry" that Maya left her (we started calling it that out of lack of speech for what to presumably name it) on Bokuyo, though her inner turmoil was afraid to dip her fingers in the huge cash left in her name. We took out just a _little _money, a sum of two thousand dollars, so she'd be comforted that she did not take _too _much out—my mother went to the bank with her to help assist her with the infuriating process of banking, handling money, taking it out, and other finance things that I wasn't even close to being sharp about.

With that money, she, Bokuyo, and Misako had binged on buying _all sorts _of baby commodities that he'd need to be happy, things he'd need down the road, such as teething rings. She bought him a baby walker, a small swing we hung from the ceiling that Bokuyo _loved, _a miniature baby tent that he'd lay under on his back and play with the dangling toys in, and other essential things. But in the end, it never stopped Seiko from being detached from her son.

It was expected that she wouldn't be totally there, raising him. It was predictable that she wouldn't be able to connect with him, because she hadn't _asked _for him, nor planned on having him. He had sprung up on her twice already. Both times, he was unexpected. And, I mean, she's Seiko, and having _her _be able to say "I love you" to a child she never prompted aspiration for made it harder to be the mother that perhaps Boku wanted. We'd seen that, no matter what, he loved her anyway. That never eliminated any of the key points I just brought up.

So I tried to be the best adult figure in his life. I felt pity for him—I mean, I had wanted a mom when I was younger, and I'd wanted a dad to be there for me. Obviously, his dad is never coming back, so I tried my hardest to become who _I _had wanted as a kid. I did the things Seiko couldn't consistently provide: a playmate, a friend, someone to dress him, someone to hold him, burp him, carry him around. The only thing I _didn't _do was feed him, because I obviously don't have the proper assets for that. But I took care of him. Zane, too, was also a dependable reoccurrant in Bokuyo's life; you'd think that Zane and I would be his adopted parents with the way we cared for him. Soon, not to take that in any _yaoi-_inspiring ways, Ed and Edna became the first pair of grandparents to Boku, and Damon and Misako became his second. In his bright blue eyes that one day turned a light shade of brown, I could see Bokuyo's affection glow for both pairs. His real grandfather happened to stay completely out of the picture. I don't know if he was ever confronted by his daughter in some _stay out of his life _way, but I did know that, upon hearing from Zane who talked to Cole on the phone all the time, Lou was very active in his own son's life. He didn't bother trying with us. It angered me. I mean, here he was, a man with two decent children, and he publicly favored one over the other without fabrication attempts to cover up his open dislike to his daughter? Was it because Cole went to the Oppenheimer like Lou always wanted, and even better yet, the _college _of Oppenheimer? Was that it?

It infuriated me that Lou acted like such an ass about it. It made me _so mad. _I couldn't believe you'd just _choose _to stay out of your grandchildren's life; if anything, your goal would be to be _in _it. As far as I knew, he was very cozy with the idea of staying in Rie's life, and Rie was the friggin' spawn of an _affair! _You'd think even the smallest dose of _sympathy _would carry you into your grandson's life. But he tried his hardest to be _out. _

Seiko's detached mother syndrome continued on for at least seven months after she gave birth to him. Though Zane and I tried to get her motivated, we finally hired a mobile counselor to, after Zane couldn't reach her, come to the monastery and help her out through the field his profession centered around. I thought that would work. Getting her to discuss the trauma that was taking her over. The trauma that was, in turn of the darkness settling inside her Yin-heart, keeping me safe from the Devourer's venom. As long as Seiko keeps to her side of the scale—meaning, as long as she is a dark, depressed, unhappy creature—I will not be affected by the venom. Not really, anyway. But the second she even tries to step into the light—boom. I'm not balanced anymore, and everything shifts awkwardly in the world because of it. A little scary, right? You'd think I would _want _her to stay that way so I wouldn't have to become my father's replica. But in the end…where did that get _her?_

Seiko pretty much tried to beat the hell out of the counselor for being so "intrusive, nosy, and downright _rude _about barging into her life," after which we dipped our hands into her bank account _again _to bribe him not to press charges and maybe get some counseling of his own for that personal trauma. She didn't talk to Zane and me for three days straight.

After that, Seiko became interested in buying an apartment. Which was weird, considering the question "WHY? You don't even take _care _of Bokuyo when _we're_ here; he'll completely _die _if you take him away!" that came out of my mouth. I'd been a little devastated that she'd take him away from me, the kid I'd grown so attached to, despite the wailing. Seiko had gotten angry at me. (Again.) She ended up buying an apartment in a city called Artenia, nearby Ninjago City by a couple miles. Seiko was dead set on moving out of the monastery. I thought she might've been mad at me because we'd got her the counselor, but this was different. Out of total worry for Bokuyo and Seiko's chronic depression, my belief being that she'd hurt herself if she was alone and Bokuyo would die without being properly cared for, I moved in with her, never taking _no _for an answer, and became official roommates with Seiko. Zane happily urged me to do so, never showing signs of sadness, but I felt guilty for leaving him alone at the monastery as the last Ninja standing. He didn't care, he told me. "I'm going to end up here anyway."

"Why?" I'd asked.

"Because these people here are the only thing of my father I have left."

I kept in contact with Zane the whole time Seiko and I were looking for jobs to pay for rent. Seiko's sudden vow to keep her nose out of her bank account for goodness-knows-why made her stubbornness to compatibly worship the ugliness of finding a job when you have a bad history. She, finally, found two jobs in Artenia, one waitressing and the other being a cashier for a coffee shop. I found my own job at Doomsday Comics in Ninjago City. It wasn't the same without Rufus there, but I promised his soul I'd help the place get back on his feet, for that's what he would've wanted for the poor place. I turned into the assistant manager when time kept moving, and I made it a place kids wanted to hang out by adding a little lounge in the corner for kids to go sit in, read their comics or do their homework, or just hang out and talk to other kids like them. They _loved _it. And I loved my job. Getting to meet kids who had the same interests I did was the foundation for whatever career I wanted to get into.

Speaking of that…

When summer ended, I found myself interested in pursuing greater education. Though the only schooling I had received lived far enough to a kick-out from Darkley's, not really the best candidate for being accepted into college with my little teachings on how to do the Pythagorean Theorem—that wasn't even the smallest thing that I needed to know—I was dying to _learn _and to grow intellectually. I found myself being accepted into a school that wasn't exactly a college, but wasn't _just _a high school, either. Located just out of Artenia, Artis G. Crumbsworth Higher Academy was the perfect place for me to go, meet new people, and earn new friends.

The best part was that I didn't have to wear a mask to move around the people to conceal my identity. If anyone recognized me as the Green Ninja, they never said anything, thankfully to my relief. My small ego couldn't take that if I were to be called out in front of a hundred-some people. With that as a total pro to the school thing, I made friends quickly at A.G.C. Genuine friends, who had _nothing _to do with the supernatural world of ninjas. Just a bunch of normal people, who had normal things to do like study for big tests, SATs, worry about college, go to work at _normal _jobs, and hang out with friends on the weekends or after school. It's not like I was replacing the other ninja in my lives with new people who were better than their absent memory. Nobody could ever truly fill the spots that the others, so broken off from me, did. Especially Kai's seat as my best friend. But when time went on, I realized that, to my heartbreak that left me in the middle of my epiphany struck broken and shocked, Kai wasn't ever coming back. I was holding onto his sleeve too tightly, holding him back from moving on; it explained why he never answered my phone calls anymore. It was _me _who needed to move on. Kai already _had_.

My best friend became Caleb Walters. Other than having the ninja background, Caleb was sort of like another me, just more unique. He was an avid gamer, a comic book lover who used to read Fritz Donnegan too and introduced me to this strange form of comics called "anime" that I thought was pretty cool, and even a cosplayer, which I found was really cool because I had secretly always been fascinated by that. He was a genuine, carefree guy who cracked jokes all the time, lived a carefree life, and was pretty much my definition of a un-nerdy "nerd-like" dude. He didn't have the knowledge, broken glasses mended by tape, suspenders, or the Napoleon Dynamite characteristics of what the idea of a "nerd" is when you hear the word. He was into all that type of electronic stuff, liked computers, enjoyed the same stuff _I _did. Caleb became my best friend—shaggy brown hair, light green eyes, and a face that said "You might not like me for who I am and my outgoing attitude, but I seriously don't care what you think. I am me, and I'm totally okay with that." He was so _positive _that it was awesome.

He was also unaffected by the things _I'd _been ruined by in my past. In my inclusive circle of friends, everyone was so normal that sometimes I felt left out of that ringlet of ordinary that surrounded them. I came to terms with the knowledge that that part of my life—the part where I was a "hero"—was over. As far as these guys knew, I was normal. And that was three-hundred-and-million percent _perfect. _Maybe that was why the other Ninja never talked to me anymore (not counting Zane. Zane doesn't have the ability to ignore people.) Maybe they wanted to forget, too.

I never allowed Caleb to come visit the monastery at my house, but after school, almost every day, it was he and I that hung out together, studied, went to bonfires (which I realized were, like, the coolest thing ever) and into town and attended things we weren't legally allowed into but went for anyway. We went to senior parties with the group of people that I had slowly become a part of, a group of just normal guys who happened to be in the same interest formation as Caleb and I. After helping him put together some of his amazing pieces, I attended cosplay conventions with Caleb and other tagalong friends, watched him present his costumes proudly upon the stage and _wear _the character he was playing, and be pretty much the coolest normal dude I'd ever met. He wowed the crowds with his craftsmanship. I didn't know how he found the time to create realistic pieces that took days, weeks, _months _to finish _and _keep his homework tidy, but he did it. Maybe he secretly was Burt Wonderstone or something.

Then, everything changed.

At one anime convention we went to, while mingling among other cosplayers and checking out everybody else's designs, Caleb introduced me to a friend of his dressed up as Yuna from _Final Fantasy X _and _X-2, _a pair of my favorite games_. _Her name, he told me mock-deliberately, was Summer Anne Riley, but she preferred to go under the alias Seloria Fujisha, "because that was cooler than being named after her grandmother." When my eyes fell upon the light brown eyes hidden behind the bangs of Yuna's perfecting wig, it felt like all time had stopped.

My heart pounded in my chest, fueling the stubborn heat to my cheeks, accompanying the sudden rush of air from my body. With every sound I could've surveyed suddenly becoming indefinite, their answers becoming incomplete, time had frozen into this one, tiny space loop of never-endingly looking into the pale eyes that welcomed me with a flash of white teeth under a smile. It was nothing, in that room filled with hundreds, spectators and participants to the Con alike, but me and this girl I had only just met. Her hand gracefully extended outwards to me, her pink dip-dyed sleeves dangling off her thin arm like some sort of silk. Her face was slender and pale skinned, the complexion of one who neither tans nor burns, and her eyes were the calm shape of an almond, her lips only a pink line around the rim of her bright smile. Without even knowing me, she did not bias her thoughts or think I was someone I was not, and was openly friendly from the get-go. The brown bangs of her wig masked one eyebrow lightly, but they were both dark, darker than the wig's shade, telling me that she had a darker hair color than the one she was sporting. Her small, dainty round teeth showed through her smile. My cheeks flamed hotter than the fire I could call to my fingertips. I had looked to her hand, the unblemished skin of her fingers and the absence of visible bloodlines coursing underneath the light flesh, and I had reached out, heart's thunders all I could hear, to grasp the outstretched greeting. The minute my hand wrapped around hers, an electrical bolt shot through my body, lighting my nerves, and making my heartbeat rush in my ears like a waterfall's cry. My winded breath caught in my throat. Our eyes had met. She had blinked.

I fell in love with her from the moment I saw her.

Maybe—or maybe not—you'd ever want to hear of the four years that I spent dating her, out of the five I'm telling you about now. (Almost six.) I don't know what you want. I'll touch more on this topic later.

I learned faster than I thought I would at A.G.C. Maybe it was involved with my rapidly-aged brain. I don't know. But soon, the Pythagorean Theorem I had previously been oblivious to was embedded into my mindset, and every stupid equation after it left its scar. My aesthetic in learning was astounding, even to me. Everything was just too…_easy. _Like I'd already done all of it before or something. I took advanced placement classes in everything _but _mathematics, for knowing that I'd screw myself over if I tried to achieve anything bigger than the lowest math class I could get to that wouldn't be sticking me into two hours of math a day. Math sucks. I suck _at _math. Since I had to be enrolled at an twelfth grade level for my age (don't ask me how my parents managed to let that happen with my background on schooling, but I think that the ever-magical robots of the monastery arranged something with the principal) I graduated from there quickly, with Caleb and Seloria at my sides, and upon graduation day I did, out of manifest of melancholic memories, scan the crowd of spectators for a certain poke of spiky brown hair in the midst. I didn't find Kai there—why would he have come, anyway? It's not like he knew what I was doing; he'd avoided my phone calls for such a long time that it was no surprise we probably weren't even categorized as friends anymore. I took that revelation to heart and pain, tooth to nail, and was shuffled on my way to a college—where stuff _really _mattered.

I won't explain the cruddy process of college applying and shit, but I ended up picking a place, again, nearby Artenia (to my happiness) to a certain distance. The place had nothing to do with A.G.C., but somehow, again, even with my lack of academic background _up_ to A.G.C., I was accepted happily into Schuelyer University in the neighboring community of Vantage. Little did I know, that was almost the—**_pardon the American analogy_—the freakin' Harvard when it came to colleges in the area. Taking in only the best of the best, the hard workers, the great studiers, and so forth, S.U was the place to go if you wanted a chance at getting a good job in the real world. To be accepted in was a HUGE compliment. I was ecstatic when I realized that Caleb and Tyranny, another guy friend of mine, would _also _be attending the grounds of Schuelyer University; but what really made my day was when Seloria stopped by my apartment (a day I remember Seiko to be working the day shift, me taking on the role of babysitter to Boku) to tell me she'd been accepted into S.U., too.

By this point in time, I had been dating the in-real-life-a-dark-haired-beauty-with-pin-straigh t-brown-locks-and-almond-shaped-eyes Seloria for a long time now—about nine months we'd been together thus far. My initial plan, though falling for her at first glance, was not to dig for the relationship my heart wanted to have with her. When you're living with the abrasive-yet-evasive Seiko Mitsuhide, things like accepting other girls into your life tend to be a tad intimidating, not that I believed Seiko was some extremely important person whose opinion mattered to the choices I made. My fear was not _of _Seiko, but of what she'd think, say, or do that would sabotage my relationship with Seloria once she found out. I don't know why I feared that. It's just weird thinking to be living with a girl but dating a different girl at the same time. Seiko had already met Caleb numerous times, but I never once showed her to Seloria. Especially after I found myself falling more for Selie and finally beginning dating her, I kept her as far from Seiko as the laws of physics would allow me to. Seloria knew about Seiko, but for the next five years, Seiko didn't know about Seloria. Bad move, on my part.

Selie was, in many terms, the type of girl that I find interest in. She wasn't girly, she wasn't overbearing, and she wasn't the makeup type of girl but by no means the down-to-gritty type either. She wasn't afraid to get her hands dirty, but favored not to, if it wasn't chiefly obligatory. A master enjoyer of many comic books, video games, and _yes, _cosplay, Selie dressed for comfort, ate anything (without having huge constraints on her eating in case of a "diet", which she complained asked too much of her, since she loved food too much) but evened out her consumption with jogging and yoga/Pilates. She didn't tolerate negativity, and stood up for what she believed in. (Which is why Seiko would _never _like her.) She was outgoing, loved kids, liked to volunteer for things that had to do with taking care of animals. (Her lifelong dream was to be a veterinarian.) A wallflower may have been her casted title in high school, but when you got to know her, she was this raging ball of passion that had the energy to light up Ninjago City at night. Her attitude was uplifting. In a way, she saved me from the unconventional despondent chasm of catastrophes that being a Ninja had put me in, and showed me the morals of life that I should be more focused to pay attention to, rather than the things that had, before, been the focus of my thoughts. On normal bases, I am not thinking about what kind of fight I'll be fighting that day. I think about things that _normal _people think about. My job. School work. My homework. All the studying I'd be doing. If I'd should go over to my girlfriend's house to study. (Since bringing her to my house would result in the first face-to-face meeting between Seiko and Seloria, a day I tried to avoid best I could.) If I should order take-out, or if I should cook before Seiko got home. Normal stuff. Basic stuff I'd never had the chance to enjoy. Now I loved every minute of it.

I've been going to S.U. for four years, taking any computer classes that I can that somehow have something to do with graphic design. My idea for life is to become a Visual Image Developer, and plan on getting my Bachelor of Arts in Computer Science at the end of this year. Selie is going to have to be in school a lot longer than me if she wants to scratch the surface of veterinary accomplishment. Caleb is still attending college in the hopes to become a movie producer. Seiko says "screw school!" and has never bothered to try and get education to land herself a job that lasts more than a few months. A _career. _I'm still workin' on getting her to at least look for some sort of schedule that could let her take a couple of classes in the afternoon, so when I get home from _my _classes, she can go and I'll watch Boku or something. On the afternoons I work, we could have my mom or Edna or somebody come watch him.

Seiko, I think, just doesn't care anymore. Since the "interaction" with Kyon that produced Bokuyo, she has not been the Seiko I'd known and shamefacedly crushed on so many years ago, but now a hollow, walking woman that is almost robotic. It's the same routine every day, a set path she's ordered herself to follow, but never a real variation to yesterday's plan. She's… What she _has _been is a handful of remorse, shame, and most of all, serious trauma. Her mental health has depleted, her view of self-worth is close to nothing, and her depression still burns, hot and fiery but dull and painful, as it had been days after it happened. She's so blackened and dark and overall _depressed_ it reminds me of when I flipped the Humanity Switch. If I wasn't here, and someone reported child neglect on Bokuyo, the community would've taken him away from her and stuck her either in some emotional rehab or a mental hospital. She's got some _serious _mood swings that pendulum between 'fury' and 'deep despair.' I haven't seen her truly happy in a long time. I feel guilty that I don't know how to help her. She's seriously traumatized, seriously devastated by this, and I know that if I get her professional help, she'd stab me in my sleep. But if I don't help her somehow, she'll fall over the edge and end up hurting herself or trying to commit suicide again.

I caught her, in her third year living with me, trying to overdose on simple pills we'd had in our medicine cabinet. I'd returned from work that night after Boku had gone to bed, seeing that the bathroom light was on and the door was cracked, finding that a little suspicious. Inside the warm glow of florescent lights that also paralleled the doom that could've happened, lest I'd been late, I'd found her holding a bottle of pills, wearing nothing but her tattered cloth robe standing in the middle of the room, and a bathtub pre-filled with water. She'd been planning on drowning herself inside it.

I stopped her from doing it and rationalized the inner desperation to be rid of her living nightmare with a replacement of emptiness that she depicted. I told no one about what I saw. Except Zane. I tell him almost everything that happens with her. He knows how to fix it, what to say; Zane's permanent dream, according to him, has always been to be a psychiatrist. In my understanding, he's going to school for that. Again, magic must've gotten him enrolled (since before he was a robot and before that he was a dead kid from the vintage days.) He's ready for doing more than just hanging out with his brother and fighting lonely battles in checker matches. You know things have finally ended when the one person who struggled to keep the flame from dying out has given up to pursue his own dreams and imaginations, to fulfill his fantasies with the oil of burning passion. He, too, has let go of being a ninja. See, I can't even capitalize it anymore. We just simply _are not_, therefore we cannot be. No ninjas allowed. This is a ninja-free lifestyle zone. All ninjas must be sent home to remove their masks and rethink their ethics. And there's one thing you can pull out of any way you say that you aren't allowing your past to stay and linger for the future:

Life moves on, whether you're ready for it to go or not.

* * *

**That's a lot. and a horror to write. 0.0 I'm just glad that now that that's over, I can begin the actual story telling now. **So...the Ninja are split up, like In Sync...Lloyd's got new best friends and a _girlfriend _(ick) that he hasn't told anyone about. Interesting. Life's moved on, indeed. **IMPORTANT NOTE:: Seloria is NOT, I repeat _NOT, _a main character in this story. Not even a smidgeon important. So don't y'all get your knickers knotted. **

**Prepare for Kai's story next chapter! ;)**

**Go have an awesome day/night! Thanks for sticking with me and all my crazy plots,  
-Kairi**


	3. 2: The Relative

**Note:  
Thank you, to all of you, who reviewed the first chapter-I really want to singlehandedly reply to each of your responses by PMing you, but my busy-ness prohibits me from getting the chance to respond to each of you individually until I have time. So I will say a HUGE thank you right here and let you know that, from each and every one of you, I do read them all, and while I can't always reply to them, I am listening and I appreciate the reviews so much. They all made me smile broadly. Thank you guys. :)**

* * *

_2. The Relative_

When Kai's mind showed the first sigh of wake that morning, he stretched out a long arm drowsily, swooping over to the other side of the bed and grabbing timidly for the shape of a shoulder or hip. He was utterly disappointed to find the sheets cold, suggesting that their tenant had left longer ago than he'd thought, and that he was a late sleeper on that regular Saturday morning when _Four Weapons _didn't open until eleven-thirty. The sunlight, long past dawn, was trying to awake him by pushing past the curtains into the form of a rectangular prism across the queen-sized bed, turning the skin underneath his eyelids a light salmon. Kai groaned groggily. Though he rose early every day of the week, he hated mornings more than he hated the taste of coffee that he tortured himself with drinking, believing that if he kept drinking it he'd one day grow either a fancy to it or a tolerance for the bitter and overpowering flavor. He was still waiting for that to happen.

He lifted his face from the crook of his arm, spread in a triangle over the crown of his head, and took a deep breath of first air. His bare chest pushed tightly against the bed sheets, crumpled underneath his body—he lately had been sleeping on his stomach—with invitation to keep to their amorous scent of night love. He still felt a cold chill creeping over his skin from the light sweat that still remained from last night. The heady perfume of several whispered _I love you_s played with his senses. Kai had to admit it: he wasn't eager to leave. He wanted to lie there all day in the warmth of his bed, his own body heat exercising the test of exactly how much of it the heavy comforter could handle, so he could sleep off the hours that he'd lost last night, but wouldn't change a thing about the previous evening.

Kai rolled onto his back, skin touching the cold side of the bed. _Too bad, _he thought, rolling onto his side, propping up his weight with the bend of his elbow and a hand to his head, staring at the empty space beside him, a slight dent still there to remind him there _had _been a real person there and not just a figment of his imagination. _I was looking forward to being the first one to wake up. _

Kai's eyes took some adjusting, but soon, the light bathing his room didn't hurt to look at. The upper floor of _Four Weapons _was primarily where he and his sister had lived for the year that their father had died, in a small three bedroom, one bathroom, half-living room and partial kitchenette building whose lower floor was swallowed by the actual business area of _Four Weapons. _That was where the blacksmithing came in. When Kai had moved back into this place five years ago, he had moved right back into his old bedroom without touching the room his parents had shared or the girly fortress that Nya had called hers (which had gone untouched until recently, when he had to turn the room into something else,) packing away the teenager things that he'd had beforehand and stuffing them in a box at the corner of his closet. Last Kai had been here, he'd been forced to grow up fast by taking on a business and watching over his younger sister at such a young age, but it was proven that he had needed more time to grow up with his attitude being shy of not-very-close-to maximum maturity. Returning, five years ago, was a different experience than he thought it would be. He looked at _Four Weapons _at a much different angle than he remembered looking at it when he was a teenager. Five years later, so many hardships faced, and plenty of battle scars to remind him of what had happened—particularly, the long slash over his left eye that crossed down the whole left side of his face, which after two years from getting it had started to pale and get worse when being used; Kai later lost sight completely in that dark brown eye—Kai was prepared to start fresh. The change in ways that Kai had seen the shop the day he came back was indescribable.

To that side note he made: Yes, Kai was blind in his right eye. He also had discovered, by taking up many visits to his doctor, that he absently acquired a loss of hearing in the left ear, a slight deafness that had come from the explosion of a bomb so near to him. He could hear in it, just barely scratching the surface of hearing. Kai had laughed humorlessly at the news—he'd walked into the office already knowing he was half-deaf—without believing it was funny at all. Kai's fears of his new disfigurement made him afraid not only of living with two disabilities, strengthening the capabilities of his outstanding eye and ear, but that one day Kai would never be able to find someone in this rapidly-growing town that would love him, incapacities, gruesome history, and all. His dream, after coming into _Four Weapons _one yearand finding quickly that he was able to successfully report the new business and bring the people of Ignacia the apparent needs of what they wanted (many customers told him they had missed this shop, having to order things _online _if they wanted them, and had to toss the broken metals that there was no blacksmith to fix. Kai had apologized a thousand times to each of them,) was to finally begin his own family. To settle down, find real love, to have children. He'd built himself up to forget all about the love that he'd left behind for his new life (Lloyd Garmadon,) to replace that with someone else he could keep, could love forever, could etc. And, to Kai's triumph, he had been able to forget all about Lloyd Garmadon and the trouble he had caused the former fire ninja.

A year or so into owning _Four Weapons _brought him face to face with a young woman around his age (then twenty-one) looking for custom-made horseshoes for her family's large and friendly farm animals, asking that the young blacksmith be the one to forge them. That was the first step into Kai's future. Tall and red haired, the woman had a circle-shaped face, a small nose fitted proportionately to her face's construction, and puckered lips faint of being handled. Her body shape had been average, but slightly on the, er, the curvaceous-and-she-didn't-like-it side, the girl worry way of_ I've-gained-a-lot-of-weight-since-my-senior-year-a nd-it's-starting-to-bug-me-because-I-think-that-my -jutting-out-waist-is-"fat"-when-it-really-isn't_; often, she complained about how she hated how fat her thighs were, when Kai didn't think they were that fat. She was not one of the girls who obsessed over popularity and public image, but did her makeup every morning, straightened her naturally wavy hair, and tried to keep herself looking fresh. She was not snobby. She was not possessed by the demand for eating only an almond a day to make sure she kept her weight in check; the woman that Kai met had curves from her passion for cooking she didn't like, but he didn't care about, looking past them to see who she really was inside, where the golden heart rested. She was, in Kai's eyes, beautiful in a slightly-awkward, having-a-hard-time-fitting-in but totally goofy and cute way. For all the defects that she thought she had, they matched the defects that _Kai _thought _he _had, and they both accepted each other for their imperfections without reason, without cause, and without complaint.

Her name, rolling off of Kai's tongue every time he said it and tasting of hope, was Anya. He'd started dating her soon after their first meeting, and he'd been with her ever since. The second step into Kai's future was the silver band on his left ring finger that embraced the small wedding they'd had a year and a half ago—a wedding that Kai had strongly, enforcingly, and proudly kept his past uninvited to, making sure that there was absolutely _no _reminder there of the people he didn't invite to ruin his day. It wasn't that Kai didn't want Jay or Nya or Zane or Cole to be there. Trust him, having them there would've made the day even _more _perfect. He was _scared_ to invite them. The last they'd seen him, he was a mess who was completely screwed up over his own best friend, a _male, _and when you look at that person after knowing their darkest secret, you don't just _let that go. _There's no way none of them didn't look at him and see someone less than they could handle. And he'd tried _so hard _to let go of the past—since meeting Anya and keeping his mind occupied by her and the shop, he was finally able to move on with his life without any difficulties. Kai was afraid that seeing his friends again would bring all the tragedy, the hurt, the ache, the ruin crashing back down on top of him, pulling him under again, letting all the hard work he'd spent _forgetting _them crumble into ashes in the palm of his hand. So he'd kept it a secret.

As if to define that as well, Kai had gone into Nya's room and taken _everything _out—saving the personal items that she might want someday, like pictures and notebooks and things she had a connection to—to sell on the internet and give to charities, making the room barren and empty of the attachment he had once had with it. It wasn't because Kai was trying even harder to forget everything so he took away the memories of Nya he had locked away in that untouched room. It wasn't because he was trying to get revenge on those memories for resurfacing a little after his honeymoon. It was because a few months after that, Kai found out that Anya was pregnant with his child. And the baby needed a place to live.

Alexandria Hope Smith was born on the seventeenth of July, at four in the morning. She weighed seven pounds two ounces. Her eyes, like all babies, were blue at first, and her hair was a light dabble of red, like her mother's. Now, almost a year old, Alexandria (who was nicknamed Alex) had a head of curly red hair that her mother would tie off into two fluffy little pom-poms on the top of her head, and dark brown eyes just like Kai's. She loved to roll around on the floor, kick her feet, and make noises that probably were _supposed _to mean something. She loved it when Kai would press his lips to her bare stomach and blow, releasing a loud squeal of laughter and an excited fit from her chest. He understood, then, when she was born, just how Cole had felt when he first saw Rie's face. It was an unqualified, eccentric love that bloomed the first time you saw each other. A vow of protection, a vow of honor, of undying love and devotion to this little girl whose life you had given and would always improve. Seeing her, for the first time, was the third blessing towards stepping into Kai's future.

And the fourth and final nudge for the life he had ahead of him: Kai's wishes of forgetting his past and having his own family were granted. Kai didn't even think about being a ninja anymore, not ever. The thought hardly ever crossed his mind. You could almost even say he never had been one. And that, in the beginning when he first came back to Ignacia, was all he could've asked for. No Lloyd, no Jay or Nya, no Cole, no Zane, and no Sensei ever popped into his head for a visit. They were finally, happily, succeedingly, preciously _gone. _

Leaving the warmth of his bed behind, Kai Smith took to the bathroom in the abandoned second floor, knowing that Alex was wherever Anya was. He washed away at his twenty-six-year-old father body with a spicy-smelling wash, scrubbed at his revived locks of brown hair (the black dye had eventually washed out and grown back to normal, which seemed wasted when Kai had realized that he was not a convicted killer anymore…somehow that was Kaos's fault.) Afterwards, he teased the damp hair with gel, but didn't concoct them into spikes as he used to, but a messy side sweep that had the sticking-up effect to it, just lacking the drastic points. He got dressed after brushing his teeth and set out for the downstairs to find his wife and his daughter.

Kai was still tugging on the hem of his shirt when his foot hit the last stair, bringing him into the kitchen, where the smell of long-before cooked scent of breakfast. He felt his stomach churn with provided hunger in response. The kitchen/ette, it sounded, was empty of life forms—but the small, shrill squeals coming from the dining room table said otherwise. Kai ventured further from the case of the stairwell to look for the happy howls of his eight month old baby girl. The baby girl that, once upon a ninja, he never thought he'd have, especially with such a beautiful woman like his wife. He was more thankful and fortunate for this possibility than any man alive.

Placed tall in the high chair, rolling on two wheels under its long stilted legs, Alex was enthralled with the entertainment laid out before her: a couple of stuffed animals and the movement of their bodies through the fingers of Anya. She was sitting on a chair in front of Alex's belted and tabled high chair, moving around the small crinkly lion and rhino with her hands while using amusing voices to make the noises of satisfaction from Alex's mouth all the more real. Her bright eyes gave way to her happiness. Her wide smile showing pink gums and a tiny tongue rolling around inside of her mouth escorted the way her chubby little arms and teensy hands, only capable of wrapping around one of Kai's fingers, gently slapped the surface of the white table strapped in front of her. Her small feet, hidden through the holes of the car seat-like chair, kicked and flopped excitedly. Anya's back was to the arriving Kai, and it seemed in her skit, neither of them noticed. Alex's enthusiastic eyes darted after the moving rhino and lion. "'I think we should eat Cheerios for lunch,'" said Anya's voice, low and gruff for the voice of the lion. With it, the yellow and orange shape moved. "'But I think we should have Lucky Charms for lunch!'" said the rhino in a much higher voice. Alex cooed. "'Maybe we should go after this little girl and ask her what we should eat!'" the lion suggested, and simultaneously both of the stuffed animals flew through the air and moderately rubbed against Alex's small chest and shoulders, causing the baby to squeal in delight and grope for the figure of one of her toys to cling to. They tickled at the tummy of Kai's child.

He walked into the room with a smile, crossing his arms over his chest and watching from the background as Anya "attacked" Alex with little cries, adding to the loud giggles of the baby. Laughing at her daughter's contagious glee, Anya withdrew the animals to her lap, letting Alex take out all of her joy alone for a moment. Kai socialized in the display of his daughter's lighthearted carefree awakening, reaching for the toys her mother extended to her with the tiny wrinkly fingers only babies (and senior citizens, albeit in a totally different way) could have. She pulled the head of the child-safe lion into her mouth. "You don't _eat _him," Anya told her in her soft, calm, real motherly voice, reaching to tap her baby on the head with the foot of the rhino. Alex blinked while gnawing on the lion's nose.

Anya's back stood up straight—she'd always been very particular about her posture. Her long red hair was ironed into curls down her back, intentionally a bit messy, and from just this angle Kai already knew her signature light brown eyeshadow would be accumulated over her lids, masked behind her black lashes, cloaked in mascara. When she had the energy to put effort into her makeup, Kai's opinion said she looked breathtaking—but he may be a little biased, since he was her husband, after all. He made point to show his presence with a clear of his throat. Anya turned her head. _Ha, I knew it, _he said, catching the look of her beautiful eyes, rimmed with smoky palatability. Her face softened at the sight of him. "Look who decided to join the living," she said, flashing her white smile. Kai crossed the room towards her and smiled himself, feeling his own heart skirt over his features like a ballroom dance (man, that was cheesy…) taking place in the king's courtyard. He sunk into a bliss that he was sanctified with waking up to every day—and it made him so glad that he was alive to have that possibility.

Kai rested his hand on the back of her chair, using it as a prop while bending towards her. "You wore me out," he murmured, and just seconds before reaching her lips with his, Anya laughed. He pressed his mouth against hers. His mind, as it always did, exploded with pleasure and raw emotion—something he was sure was equivalent to ardor—that lasted the duration of the time it took Anya to kiss him and retreat. She was always the one to pull away. He hated it. Though he was technically twenty-six now, and twenty-six year olds weren't really supposed to sit there and make out in front of their children, Kai always had a hard time stepping away. She intoxicated him.

He broke from her and moved towards Alex, who favorably stopped chewing on her lion to look up and give him a big, pink, gummy smile. It was only till recently that she learned how to do this—and it was, he decided, her favorite thing to do outside of biting people's ears. She reached up both hands, dropping the toy in her lap, for him, asking, _Up, Daddy! _Kai carefully removed the white table before he picked her up, tucking her into his arms and kissing her across the forehead. Her small hands rested on his shoulder line, breaking there. Kai smiled into her face. "Good morning," he said. In the way that people always did when discussing things with children, Kai's voice changed a little, voice a bit higher and gentler than if he were speaking to another adult. He leaned his forehead across hers. Alex reached up and distached them with a grab at his nose. "You slept good last night," he said. "Didn't bug us or anything."

"I think she was tired from all the excitement yesterday," said Anya, standing up beside him and using her own fingers to tickle her daughter's cheek, touch feather-light against the soft baby skin. Alex squeezed Kai's nose again.

"Probably." Kai shifted Alex onto the side of his body so he could watch Anya sashay across the room towards the counter of the kitchen, hands skirting temptatiously over the curb of the kiosk before touching the long handle of the refrigerator. Alex flexed her hand over Kai's cheek. He turned his face at the last second and chewed on her fingertip with his lips as padding over his teeth, not using any actual pressure on her. The baby made a sound of delight.

Kai watched Anya bend over into the icebox, looking for something while speaking into the cold depth, a cave where food was stored for save. "I made breakfast this morning; waffles, but you didn't get up early enough to have 'em warm, so I just put them in a baggie in the fridge for you." She closed her hands over a bag and pulled them out, nudging the door shut.

"Thanks," Kai said, moving Alex in his arms again. "When did you get up?"

"Mmm…Well, _she _got up around eight, so I did too."

Kai's eyes flicked to the digital clock on the stove. The time read 9:18. "That makes me sound horrible."

Anya held out her arms to trade the waffles for the baby. Kai relented with a kiss to Alex's nose—her response to that was a hard blink—before letting his daughter become property of the hands of someone else, the loss of her perfect-fitting shape to the crook of his arm heavy and hurtful. He took the bag. "You can blame me for that," Anya purred, giving him a wink, letting Kai's cheeks heat. He turned back to the cupboards, in search of a microwaveable plate to hide the rising flame. "So…" She cleared her throat. Kai discarded the waffles from their Ziploc onto the hard, cool glass surface of a white plate, sticking it into the cupboard-suspended microwave by the brim, then letting the door fall shut before pressing the timer. The black equipment whirred to life. As he waited, Kai turned his back to rest the small of it lean on the counter. Anya looked hesitant.

"What?" He asked. She never looked like that unless she had something to say that she knew Kai wouldn't like. He had a bad feeling that their blissful night's dream was about to be crushed.

Instead of meeting his eyes, Anya turned away so she could set Alex back into her high chair. Her hands were busy strapping the cooing baby in, giving her a diversion to place her attention to. Kai pursed his lips. "My brother called me this morning," she said quietly.

"O…kayyy…? Which one?" That didn't seem like such a big deal. Anya's family, coming from a farm, was large; she had four brothers to her only girl in the family shame. Kai had met only three of them, and genuinely liked each for their outstanding personalities, corresponding to their sister's, just only a little picky to her because they were siblings. (He could relate to that; he used to pick on Nya, too.) He'd met her parents, as well, and loved Mary and Joseph, just like he loved the three brothers, Tod, Brody, and Kirk. The one brother he'd never met, though, was the troublemaker, and according to Anya, the "disappointment" of the family, who had moved out of Ignacia when he was eighteen and had lost all contact with them since. None of them even _knew _anything about his new life. She never liked to talk much about him. He was off-limits for discussions.

"It was Kirk," she explained, her voice a little quieter than the last time. Kirk was the oldest brother, thirty-nine years old. He was the closest to Anya, while the other two that Kai had met, Tod and Brody, were the thirty-six year old twins. And the brother Kai hadn't met was, obviously, the youngest son. (Anya was the baby of the family.) He didn't know how old that jerk was. Anya ran her hands over the edge of Alex's white table. "He was calling to tell me that…"

The microwave beeped, explaining it was done, but Kai ignored it. He stood up straight and crossed the room towards Anya. She looked a little too worried and a little too scared to just be talking about any little phone call. His worry for his wife pulled her into his arms and let her face him, better to speak with, and tucked her hair behind her ears in reassurance while she braced her hands over his chest, looking dubiously nervous. She kept her eyes down. "What?" Kai asked her, kissing her on the cheek where it met her nose. "You can tell me, babe. You know I won't get mad." _I haven't gotten mad for five years. My anger issues are gone. I'm not going to hurt you, sweetheart. _The rest of that was unsaid.

Still, she hesitated. She took a deep breath. "He was calling to tell me that…that _he _came home." Her voice fell into a dead whisper. Kai frowned.

"Who? Tod?" Tod had been away on a trip with his wife and children for a week. Had something happened to him?

"No." Now, Anya couldn't even say much above a whisper. Kai cupped her cheeks, stroking the soft skin with his thumbs, focusing his gaze to her prevented eyes with his head bent to try and catch her wandering contemplation. "It was… Kai," Anya clutched his shirt, raising her eyes to him, trying to cut off her glistening tears. Kai's concern grew. "It was Jeremy. Jeremy came home."

_Jeremy. _

The brother he'd never met.

The brother who had left the family, the meanest brother, the brother who used to put worms in Anya's spaghetti (Kai learned that from Kirk) and pick on her for being chubby. The brother that Kai didn't have to know to dislike. The jerk. The asshole. _That _Jeremy.

"Why the hell did _he _come home?" Kai asked, trying to keep the ice out of his voice. Anya chewed her lip.

"Kirk said that Jeremy invaded Ma and Pa's farm with a really expensive car," she explained. "He said that he was wearing expensive clothes from overseas. Sunglasses on, wearing a black leather jacket, black jeans, black boots, rings on his fingers. Raggy and slick dark hair. Kirk told me that he looked like an expensive gangster out of a city."

The image of that made Kai's teeth clench once and unclench. Kai had never actually seen a picture of Jeremy to know what he looked like, but the image wasn't pleasing to him. He ran his hands down her shoulders and onto her waist, pulling her closer. Anya looked scared.

"What did he do?" _If he hurt Mary or Joseph…_Kai had left behind his violence, but if either of the elderly, loving couple he'd come to love like his own parents was hurt, that kid was going to get his ass kicked.

Anya squeezed her eyes shut. "Kirk said that he came up to the farm, yelling, walking through the house and busting open the doors. He wouldn't succumb to the force Kirk tried to use to get him to stop. He broke a couple of things. When Kirk asked him what he was doing, Jeremy spat in his face and told him he was looking for…for me." Her voice crumbled. Kai grabbed a handful of her shirt in suspense. He prompted her as to what was done. "Jeremy said that he had heard that I had married the Fire Ninja and that we'd gotten into a serious relationship, and he was going to beat the crap out of you for it. Kirk only backed up the information he had." Anya's voice ended oddly. She kept her eyes on Kai's chest.

Huh.

Not the first time Kai had heard that someone wanted to beat him up, but it made him reel.

_He doesn't even like Anya. Is he just looking for someone to pick a fight with?_

"Don't ask me how he knew that you were the Fire Ninja," Anya said. She knew only a little bit about Kai's past, but did indeed know he'd been a ninja before he met her. "I didn't tell anyone."

In response, at a loss for what to say, Kai kissed her forehead. What was he supposed to say? Anya continued. "Kirk said before they had a chance to settle him down and ask questions, Jeremy got into his car and drove away. But before he left, he said that he'd find me, no matter where I was hiding, and the outcome wouldn't be pretty."

Kai didn't know why Jeremy was so linked to beating him up, but he was sure of one thing: "He's not going to hurt you," Kai said, dark and determined. "I'd never let him." He hadn't fought, physically, or called upon the Fire since he left the ninja, but if Jeremy was feeling like picking a fight and trying to hurt Anya, then a fight he'd lose was what he'd get. Kai didn't take crap from people—and threatening his _wife _like that was crossing the line. He kissed her on the forehead again, roughly. "I'll keep you safe from him, your heart _and _your soul," he promised. Anya looked doubtful. "No matter what, he won't ever be able to hurt you; I'd never let him. Nobody gets to threaten _my _wife and get away with it."

There was darkness in Kai's future the second that he said that. In part, it was because of the lie he'd just subconsciously told, without knowing what he'd just cooked himself after he said it, obliviously kissing her on the mouth this time and proving to her, through his embrace, that he was _never _going to let her get hurt. He'd never learned the valuable lesson from God not to make promises that he cannot keep.

* * *

_(Foreshadowing.) Kind of a crap end to that, but I'm short on time._

**BURNING FAN QUESTION: Who should I write about next? Zane? Jay? Cole? ****_Noel? _****You decide! [Please and thank you!]**

So plz lemme know who you want to hear from next, and I will flow with the majority vote! Don't answer and forever hold your peace! ^-^** Go have an AWESOME day/night, thank you for reading, and I love you all!**

**~Kairi :3**


	4. 3: Ah, to be a Brother

**NOTE:**

**The lullaby "Blood Rose My Beautiful" was mentioned once, by Cole, in either book 2 or 3, when he was talking about the night that Maya transformed him into a vampire. She'd been singing it to him as he began to chance. I'm pretty sure it was Book 3 when Maya was first introduced to the story that this was mentioned. Keep it in mind.**

* * *

_3. Ah, To Be a Brother_

"A…ACHOOO!"

Out the corner of his eye, Zane Montgomery saw his older brother, Rikku, jump about a foot from his comfortable rest upon the leather couch cushions, novel flapping uncertainly in his hands. Normally, nothing ever scared Rikku; after all, he was one of the many built-androids that lived in the Monastery of Peace, a type of inhuman that were designed to expect the unexpected. However, he was frightened from his deep studying of the complex words of William Splinterspeare to look up at Zane, who held the tissue to his face and sheepishly smiled. Rikku was not one to show emotion, as expected from a robot as old as he, that would vindicate he was annoyed at Zane for his involuntary outburst in mid-silence. His blank look could be taken a handful of ways that Zane did not interpret. Instead, he gently folded his used tissue upon itself, neatly cornering all the edges until it formed a small square. You don't need to worry; there was no snot in it. He sniffed without being able to breathe through one nostril to gently set the tissue inside of the small trash can beside the end of the couch. Rikku's icy blue eyes tracked the movement.

"I sense you are not feeling any better," he observed, folding the corner of his book and softly closing the thick hardcover with one hand, earning a small _thump. _Zane gave a wary grin.

"No," he admitted, voice stuffy. "I am not." Since he remembered the truth about who he was after having his memory hijacked, Zane could not recall a time when he felt as sick as he did now: head pounding, nose plugged, every movement laborious. His eyes said he was tired, but his heart said that he was done lying around. His combination of the common cold and a smidgeon of having the stomach flu for a couple of days had banned him to social interaction with his family for a _week, _enclosing him into his bedroom to lie there, day after day, in poor health. Today, Zane boycotted lying there and doodling on his interactive tablet for new recipes to longingly stare at, wishing he could cook for someone. There was no one at the monastery who ate human food but him; it was better to cook a feast for a whole brigade of people—at least, that's what his instincts told him, but his current situation told him that he was poorly out of luck. He didn't _have _people to cook for. Nobody could digest the food he ate. Much less actually EAT. He'd done a survey once in sheer boredom, leading to results that proved ninety-eight percent of the robots living here, if they ate food, would end up having malfunctions because their "throats" did not lead to a stomach tract. They led to a fan-operated voice synthesizer that would clog, explode, and murder the robot themselves. When Zane had been one of them in his second life, he'd been the only model robot that could consume food and reproduce it into energy that powered his "batteries," therefore giving him the dynamism to survive. His father, Dr. Julien Juliens, had not wanted to ever make another robot just like him, willing to keep his favorite creation one-of-a-kind. So when Zane's robot body died, so did the model.

Up until recently, Zane had not ever seen that body, until he was brought a little surprise by a birthday present from Ming Montgomery, his brother's wife. (Also an android.) She had somehow worked with Rikku to _recover his robotic format _from the ruins of the _Destiny's Bounty II, _a flying ship that once he and his former brethren were afraid of abandoning, unsure of how they'd live without one another. Whenever Zane thought of that, he laughed bitterly. Look at them now. All separated. All torn apart. All nothing. They'd all been so scared of leaving each other, and up until five years ago, that had been true. But the month after a battle so disgusting was fought, the battle that they sort of helped perform against one of Ninjago's greatest threats, a half-breed named Kaos, everyone had been all too eager to pack their bags and leave. And it seemed like none of them were friendly to the idea of keeping contact. Except for Zane and his best friend, Cole Mitsuhide, whom he called frequently every few months to keep a what's-in-the-know tab on him. But the other two, Jay Walker and Kai Smith, he had not seen since they parted with him. His youngest best friend, a fellow under the name Lloyd Garmadon, was no stranger to keeping contacts with Zane—he was extremely relieved that at least _one _of them wanted to keep the flame alive. After all, Lloyd stayed with him for about a year after the Kaos incident with his now-roommate, Miss Seiko, until she requested a transfer of living status; Lloyd, fearful for her neglected son's life, had trailed along behind her to live under the same roof to keep an eye on the child. But he visited, he called, and that was all Zane could've asked for.

If only Jay and Kai were as considerate. Sometimes, Zane laid there and wondered, _Do they even miss me? I don't think they do. I don't believe they think about me. I don't believe they still want to be my friend. If I ran into them at the market and said, "Hello, brother," I don't think they would refer to me as a "brother" back. I think they would pretend I was not that, once upon a time. Even Cole sometimes seems like he's somewhere else. Is it me? Am I too different from them to earn a call every once in a while?_

Zane had always felt different from the others. It was because he _was _different, when he met them. At the time, he was a robot, incapable of feeling very strong emotions, however dimly they may have shined. With salvage of all his memories, Zane was able to learn that his interactions as a human carried out into his robotic intentions: he had been a human child of autism, which Julien had once told him he tried to keep inside of the robot form of himself. _Why? _Zane had wondered, wishing he could be extroverted to avoid the shameless pity of his brothers when they asked him about his past when they first met, earning a stammered, nervous answer of disregard. Being outgoing would've done him wonders. And to the consonant question, Dr. Julien had decisively replied, "Because though it was a terrible thing, it was what made you the marvelous man you are today. Without it, you would not be the same, and then you would not be Zane."

Zane still wished.

When the Elemental Leaders regarded giving him back his life after dying out of his robot body—where, he found, his soul had been suspended until the body retired, releasing it—they had been particular about what traits they gave him. They kept the introverted socio-preference, but eliminated the crippling autism, thankfully to Zane's gratitude. Though it was not fully an acquittal from inward-pointed emotions, it was better than being afraid of people, and he was better able to interact with the world around him without having a disorder breathing hot bouts onto his neck.

Zane grabbed a new tissue and pressed it to his nose. He felt tired, indeed, but he wanted to be _awake, _moving, and alive. Lying in bed was so…so BORING. So bland. So uneventful. He was glad to have a nice, warm bed to rest in, but he was not pleased with the entertainment of it; he should invent a bed that has some sort of system for eliminating boredness. When Rikku had first caught signs of Zane's consistent sneezing with a chary eye, he'd automatically dragged him into the infirmary built into the monastery's labyrinth in search of the young healer that often exiled himself into that very shelter. Yuki Akamatsu, a robot with delicate, angelic features that resembled not man nor woman, came from a long history of human practice in healing and was in fact so skilled that he knew everything of the everything—according to Zane, anyway, who knew nothing about medicine. And someone so beautiful in a heartbreaking way as well as one procuring great talent did not come without a withering past that haunted he and captivated others.

Many, many years ago, before he was condemned to robotism, Yuki was born to a poor herbalist and her husband, literally brought up for the purpose of learning how to manage herbs, fix wounds, and earn skill in medicinal fields of study so that he one day would have the skill to take over their small-town herbal store. Back then, in Yuki's time, there were not many chances of he, such a poor young man, to find himself able to slip into a college; colleges, at the time, were perceived as places where the rich could send their children, a place Yuki would never touch grounds on. His sole purpose was to grow up and take over his parents' store for the people living in Shamanau, a town nearby Zane's own birthplace, the Fireman's Circle. But Yuki's father was a calculative man, and when he saw how Yuki was growing up, he took note that his son had almost inhuman good looks—inhuman enough that could capture the interest of many fine, rich young women. His divine movements, facial details, and bodily grace did, in fact, do as his father predicted when he sent the boy to a _college attendance_ . At the time, those were screenings, firsthand meetings between the owners of the colleges and the students that would like to enter their college. It was a way that the owners could look and see just who they were accepting into their realm of high education, what kind of riches they could get from the families paying for their children to attend, and that involved a hell of a lot of bias. If you didn't look the part, you were denied entry even before you'd applied. Though Yuki's family owned nothing expensive, his parents scrounged together enough money to pay for a fine suit of clothing that would make him look somewhat appeasable. But his father was not sending him to let him look for education, a plan not discussed with his son. He was sending him to see how many heavy-lashed eyes he could catch from the jewel-encrusted women in hopes that one of them would be brave enough to take in the beautiful young boy. It was like throwing a chunk of meat to a hungry pack of dogs. Each one would want a taste the second they laid eyes on it without bothering to see if it was cooked or not. The "cooked" analogy relating to their money status, Yuki's father had sent him on his way without letting him know the secret part of the scheme.

Yuki did catch the eyes of many—his beauty was too much for the women to deny, and soon they all had swarmed him, vying for his attention, begging for his hand. Yuki politely had tolerated each of the women in courtesy for the hungry maidens without knowing the true motive of his father's intentions, but his heart, which he was expected to give, was somewhere else.

A part of Yuki that his parents did _not _know of was the part of him that had already fallen in love. His mention of this event had gone unnoticed, for whenever he tried to speak it aloud for his parents to hear, he became frightened of what they'd think and swallowed his confession whole. At a time in his life that Yuki never mentioned to Zane when telling him the story of his past, he had met a young woman—a poor woman, her family's financial needs quite similar to Yuki's—when he was out in the wood scavenging for herbs to bring back to his mother. He had been roaming for a purple batch of flowers called Athena's Tears, finding that they were apparently not as native to the land that his mother had claimed, until he had heard musical notes carrying through the whisper of the soft trees. The voice, he described to Zane, had been a woman's, hitting all the right notes and taking the lyrics deeper into heart than anyone he'd ever heard. He followed the sound of her voice, veering off the cleared path in search for her, desperate to find the one whose song had melted his heart. He finally found her sitting in a wooden swing attached by two ropes on either side of a plank, dangling from a tree, as she quietly kicked her legs back and forth. A long white dress whistled around her ankles, long black hair cascading down her back, singing a song that Yuki recognized to be the lullaby "Blood Rose My Beautiful." It was a haunting melody that her voice perfectly seized. In her hands she peeled the violet petals off an Athena's Tear that Yuki had been looking for, and the base of the tree her swing was attached to was _surrounded _by them. Yuki figured he'd wait for her to leave—he couldn't see her face at the time—so he waited in the bushes to listen to her voice carry throughout the quiet wood, silencing all the animals into a breezy quiet so that all may hesitate to listen to her splendor. Time passed, and she did not leave, instead picking the flowers at her feet again and again and peeling them apart, letting their petals shift through the wind, carried to some place that Yuki did not know of—perhaps a better tomorrow. When she finally fell silent, it appeared she'd fallen asleep with her head resting against one of the ropes holding her up, so Yuki detained the chance to jump up to his feet, quickly steal a couple of flowers, and hopefully leave in a fair amount of time.

But that did not happen. She was not asleep. When Yuki rustled out of the bushes to grab a few flowers, she jumped to her feet, whirled, met his eyes, and that was all it took. Her beautifully white painted face, soft blue eyes masked in glisten, her faint red lips puckered slightly, her angry face roaring at him in accusing of spying on her (which he had indeed been doing) made Yuki weak in the knees. Before he could ask her name through her tantrum of anger, she ran off, and Yuki couldn't find her.

For days her face had haunted him, reminding him of the beautiful woman who sung a melody that silenced the whole world in respite. He asked many people in town if they knew a woman that matched her description, but none could say they did. He was troubled until one night when he could not bear to lie on his mat and fall asleep to dream of the woman he did not know any longer, for her face tormented him. Yuki found himself taking a walk without knowing where he was going in the middle of the pale midnight, milky moon bathing him in half-shadows but lighting up his way. Before he knew it, he was in the middle of the woods—exactly at the spot where he had first met the woman. So he sat at the base of the tree beside the old hanging willow's swing and waited for her. Every night, Yuki went back again and again and again, hoping that he would somehow catch sight of her again, the mysterious disappearing woman that no one in town had ever heard of. After a month, it seemed that he would never meet her again, and he was about to give up—when he heard a rustle in the wood.

Startled, he turned to find her emerging, wearing a long white evening gown much like the one he'd first encountered her in. She had frozen, staring at him with wide eyes, shocked to find him here with a gas lamp flaming at his side and a necklace he'd woven out of grass sitting in his lap, at such an odd time of the night. Yuki, too, had thought he was dreaming, but he'd snapped out quickly, sprung to his feet, and begged her of her identity. He claimed to her that she had "crept upon his dreams in the bitterest of sleep and drawled him with the most horrid of nightmares and the most beautiful of imaginations, one that surely could denounce a poet to shame with the grand fantasies, the dreams in which made his whole body tingle." He confessed that he felt like he'd fallen in love with her (keep in mind, this was long before real technology like robots existed, and human morals were different) even though they had only ever met once. And to his surprise, the young woman had said the same.

Her name was Mitsuko, and she did not live in Shamanau, explaining why nobody had ever heard of her. She lived in the expanded city of Fireman's Circle, but hardly ever left the safety of her own home because her parents banned her from seeing the outside world. She often snuck out of the house at night to come to this forest, to see what the world really was. She was delicate, but had an inside of iron; she was weary of the twitterpated stranger that Yuki was in her eyes. But it was not a question for Yuki; he was in love with her.

Every night they both returned to that very spot at the first sign of midnight, and there, Yuki fell more and more for the girl who had never seen the wonders the world had to offer, things viewed insignificantly like the cocoons of butterflies or even the first photography lens that was ever invented. She didn't know what a kitten was , or what the inside of a candy store looked like. Yuki found that devastating. He betted that she'd never even tasted _Lloyd's Candy Company's _chocolate before. So the next night, he brought her some that he'd bought from the candy shop. Mitsuko looked in heaven when she first tasted it. The night after that, he brought her a kitten that he'd bought from a pet store on the corner street, using his family's hard earned money in the cloak of love, so tamed and blinded by it that Mitsuko was all he could see. At first, she was frightened of the pure white kitten with glass blue eyes (He had gotten that one because it looked just like her) but quickly found a fondness for the gentle, mewling creature. She wanted to bring it home with her, but was so scared that her parents would find out, so Yuki promised he would take care of the kitten and bring it back every night for her so she could see her new friend, which she named Kouchikou-san.

Yuki's parents were horrified that he'd bought an animal. Yuki lied that it was for the benefit of the shop, so the kitten could chase the mice that kept breaking into their herbal closet and eating at their precious goods. His parents took the excuse and let Kouchikou stay.

Yuki wanted to tell his parents about the woman he had fallen for, whom he was intent on marrying, but when he knew that his father and mother would be disappointed and angry at him for finding a stranger, one who was not even allowed from her house, as his wife, he did not have the heart to tell them. Instead, Yuki found an abandoned house in the wood that had not been touched in years—the wood was dark, the rooms were empty, and it was infiltrated by rodents. Long story short, he fixed the place up, and surprised Mitsuko with their very own home _away _from home.

Months passed of their love. It was devastating when Mitsuko had come to him one day, crying and screaming and horrified, when she told him that her parents had arranged for her to marry a man who lived far away—too far away for her to see Yuki. That was when they concocted the outrageous idea of running away together, taking Kouchikou and leaving behind their old lives, of abandoning everything for the start of a new beginning they could spend together without the burden of their own lives weighing upon them. Mitsuko and Yuki made plans to stay in their home away from home for one day while Yuki gathered the things they would need to take with them for the journey until nightfall came, the time they would make their daring escape.

Yuki described the home away from home as being cheerful, optimistic, carrying a sense of weightlessness that did not acclaim to the ugly of the world they really did live in. It was the first night Yuki had slept upon the mat he'd brought into the home next to Mitsuko, arms wrapped around her waist the whole time they slept, afraid that if he let go she'd disappear.

To Zane, that sounded like the perfect love story. But then…he heard the end of the story—the end that he realized _he'd _brought upon. The guilt of destroying that future for Yuki terrorized Zane's conscience every time he looked at the angelic replica of the human he had once been. He didn't want to talk about it right now, with tears ready to broil out his eyes at it, but he will just say that they were never able to run away together. They never got the chance. And the worst part was that it ended in both being killed, and by his own robotic hands, the demise of the story becoming that Yuki was re-developed a robot, able to eternally mourn the loss of his beloved forever. It showed in his face every day. It killed Zane to look at. Yuki had never stopped loving Mitsuko.

Zane was a monster.

A monster with a _serious _cold.

The day that Rikku was certain his brother was ill, he brought Zane into Yuki's infirmary, a place where he liked to steer clear of because of the story in Yuki's eyes. Though he was often quiet and had not much to say when something was not asked of him, Yuki's past barked unintelligible villains against Zane's mind every time they were within the same room, interacting, but not because Yuki was holding a feral grudge against the one who took away his happiness. Yuki didn't bother to hold a grudge. He explained that grudging was tiring, and being tired was miserable. That did not stop Zane from feeling the effects of his wrongdoings.

Yuki gave Zane the remedy needed to keep his cold at bay, but prescribed him to bed rest, knowing that he needed to stay in sleep if he wanted to beat down the cold that was trying to become a heavy part of his daily life. Zane had been lying down _too much, _and he was _tired _of laying down. Like Yuki said: being tired was miserable. That's why he was up and about today, but not because he was feeling any better.

Rikku leaned forward to set his book on the coffee table. Zane held back another ravenous sneeze. "I thought perhaps your sickness would have evaporated by now," Rikku sighed, pushing himself to a stand. Zane wiggled his nose to avenge the coughs that he was choking on, trying to keep them from unearthing themselves. "It has been a week or so, has it not?"

"Um." Zane blinked. Rikku had moved on already, whether he had answered or not; the tall, darker skinned brother wandered out of the line of space between the couch and the coffee table, emerging near the living room door to sweep a lock of his stray, wavy brown hair behind his ear. The low ponytail crept at his neck was starting to lose its function when the shorter strands were falling out. Rikku blinked icy, empty eyes down at his brother, crossing his arms over his broad chest, and watching him for a moment. The visible lenses in his eyes focused, zoomed in on Zane's face before zooming out. That was a scary feature that _all _the robots had. Zane hadn't ever had that, though…

"I shall go get something from Yuki," he announced, whirling on his heel. "Then you will rest."

"I do not wish to sleep anymore, brother." Zane stood up, sounding stuffy enough to dissuade his argument from validation. He trotted down the hall after the long-legged fast pace of Rikku's much more extended legs; his human ones were greedily soaking up what little energy he had after being damned to bed rest for such a long time, making him easily winded. He struggled to keep up.

"Rest is what you need."

"If rest was what I needed, I'd be healthy as a horse by now," Zane argued. "I've _been _resting. If I rest any more, I'll turn into Sleeping Beauty's distant cousin."

"I doubt that," Rikku intoned. Zane sighed at his brother's lack of understanding of sarcasm and jokes. "Horses are not totally healthy, and I promise we are not, in any way, related to a fictitious character."

He jogged to keep up. He tried to keep the beg from his voice. "Rikku, I do not mean to be defiant, but I refuse to accept your request that I get more sleep. I have _been _sleeping. I am _tired _of sleeping."

"Then you must sleep."

"Rikku—!"

The door to the infirmary was shoved open roughly without a pleasant knock or a courteous warning. The door knocked against the wall behind it, swallowing Rikku in his march towards the center of the room, where with a sheepish hesitation Zane followed, a rough sigh blasting from his mouth. He was twenty-three, for crying out loud; he didn't need to be bullied by his twenty-something year old brother, did he? He had no _reason _to have to listen to him. He ran a hand over his light blonde hair, pushing the long strands out of his eyes and grabbing a fistful of it at the crown of his head, blowing air out of puffered cheeks. Zane had long abandoned the buzz-cut he'd had before. Now, his hair was longer, kept, and cleanly, hanging under his ear lobes and silken over the nape of his neck. He let it fall as it may, storming in after his compulsive brother.

Yuki was sitting at the table in the corner of the room towards the back, where the plug-in for old models of robots needed to recharge was located. He appeared to be stringing beads onto a long ribbon that Zane had often seen him working on; the whole thing extended about ten feet in total, with numerous colored beads and many different ribbons tied together as part of its makeup. He'd only recently begun this trend of sticking beads on ropes when he was bored. Which had to be all the time, considering he never left this room anyway.

Yuki looked startled. As the only robot capable of feeling emotion, he displayed them usually and significantly. Rikku stopped in front of the table, meeting and zoning in on Yuki's face, while looking stern without having the intention to. His reflex face was furrowed brows; that was enough to make him look scary. Zane tottered in after him. "My brother is in need of another one of your herbal accommodations," Rikku demanded. "What have you?"

"I do _not—"_ Zane began.

Rikku whipped his head at him. "Speak a word of denial and I'll cut your hair in your sleep, Zane Montgomery," he snapped. Zane's jaw fell shut in blathering heat.

Yuki nodded to the tall gray cabinet across from the hospital gurney in the room, where most of his remedies were kept. "It is in the same place as before," he said in a quiet, almost unhearable voice, and dismissing them both with his inattention he bent his head back to stringing his beads onto the ribbon.

Rikku turned to the cabinet and yanked it open. He grabbed out a packet of what went inside of tea as a way to reduce headaches, stop nasal congestion, and something else Zane couldn't remember. The tea tasted like piss, but it normally helped. Rikku slammed shut the door—again, not trying to be angry, but showing this through his actions that could not recognize what he was portraying to others—and tossed the packet at Zane, who stood only a foot away. The plastic crinkled loudly as it slapped into his face. Zane jumped at the unexpected whack against his nose. Luck was able to guide it down into his palm after it fell, but he sneezed anyway at the disruption of the barrier he'd built between himself and the rising sneeze. Rikku pushed past his brother, on his way again in the _I'm the oldest so you listen to me _attitude he still had, even if he was no longer a human. He left the room.

Zane glanced uncomfortably at Yuki. The healer didn't even notice he existed, focus pointed to stringing miniature beads along the length of the ribbon.

Sighing, the man left without another word, unsure of how to approach him or say anything. He always felt awkward around Yuki. _Gee, wonder why, _he thought bitterly, and went into the kitchen to make himself some tea with the packet.

Zane was only partially boiling the water when he heard the sounds of something wooden and hard being slammed against something _else _that was wooden and hard in a beat, the noise coming from outside the shoji doors connecting the kitchen/dining room to the courtyard outside. All that was there was a deck—nothing special; nobody used the courtyard for anything anymore. Zane frowned. Who was making that noise?

His question was quickly answered after being conceived. Zane glanced up in surprise when the shoji was thrown open, revealing a bright, shining day outside steaming against the back of the silhouette standing in the doorway, a wide-brimmed hat being the first detail noticeable, the second that there was a long staff being held in the right hand of whom stood there. He stepped into the room, the dining table right next to the entrance, and instead of being backed by the sun's rays, the fluorescents jammed into the light fixtures defined the persona of the person who had entered. Zane's tense body relaxed when he recognized his old teacher, Sensei Wu, stepping into the kitchen and closing the shoji behind him with the tip of his staff. In his hand, he held a batch of white rectangular paper: envelopes.

Sensei Wu, traditional as always, used his bamboo staff to navigate around, even though he was a high-tech robot now and didn't even need it anymore, nor the large sunhat equivalent that kept light out of his eyes. He used both anyway. Zane smiled at him when Wu glanced up, a fondness for the man who had taught him so much breaking through the cloud of being sick to shine on through his day. "Hello," he said brightly. Then coughed.

"Still feeling ill?" Wu asked. He stepped into the room, holding the staff in one hand and the lump of mail in the other. Zane shrugged.

"Rikku believes I am more ill than I am," he said, peering down at his boiling water before switching off the oven, pouring it into a mug, and setting in the contents of the packet given by Yuki. He slowly stirred it while Sensei Wu moved towards his side.

"He is your brother. Brothers care for their brothers."

"I…don't know about that one." Mentally, a picture of Cole, Kai, and Jay flashed through his mind, skirting under his eyelids for just a second before the melancholy settled in. His breathing skipped for a few beats.

He felt the light tap of the bamboo's tip against the back of his head, not to hard enough to rupture his already aching head. A gentle tap that, in the days of learning, said that he was either doing something stupid or was completely off target. Being older now, there was no question that it was just being off target, for he had nothing stupid to do. Zane looked over at his wrinkled, weathered Sensei Wu who did not age, and felt a little sadness peak again. He was just feeling sorry for himself, but who wouldn't?

"I miss them," he said quietly.

"As do I, Zane," Wu softly responded, passing him the stack of letters and turning around, making as if to leave the room, a discussion continued by the clack of the staff's end against the tile floor. The sound receded to the doorway as Zane absentmindedly flipped through the letters, not really seeing their titles but zoning into his own poor emotions. He only half-heard Sensei. "You will all meet again someday. Of that I am sure. No brother goes along forgotten."

Zane picked up his mug and, lifting the brim to his lips, chucked down the stack of mail on the counter as he passed the edge of it, making for the door to go to his room. It was pointless to stand here, anyway. But as he passed, his eye caught sight of something on one of the fanned out letters, landing in a spread position, that brought him backtracking into the room. He reversed his steps until he was looking down, brows furrowed, upon one particular envelope that was different than the others. A frown merged with his lips. Zane set down his mug onto the corner of the counter, suspicion leading his fingers to reach through the air and grasp the one envelope that was not advertising bill payment _or _his name. He tugged it closer to his face. Was he—was he _really _seeing what he was seeing?

He blinked rapidly, but with every awakening, the name printed across the upper left corner, scratched in elegant handwriting, was still remaining. He reached up and fingered it for a second. _How is that possible? _He thought, and his heart started to pound. The blood in his face rushed out. The envelope was addressed to Sensei Wu, but in the upperhand corner, there was only a name and a personal note, inscribed in the same dandelion cursive that only _really old people _used.

Maybe it was wrong to be staring at someone else's mail. But this envelope had the name of the devil written across the upper corner, practically implying a big red trace of lipstick in the shape of a woman's lips in the corner, and not in a good way. _You were dead, _he thought, head buzzing. He looked at the words in the corner again. _I know you were dead. I was there. I lived it. You were _dead.

This could only mean one thing.

_Looking forward to analyzing your riposte, old man.  
—Eloquim, formerly Deadly_

Zane was going to need something a _lot _stronger than tea if he wanted to figure this one out.

* * *

(**BFQ: So do you want Cole, Noel, or Jay next? You decide!)**

**thanks so much, you guys!** I appreciate everything you say, and trust me, I'm trying to find time to reply to you guys, my schedule is just really booked with school!** So, I love you all, and go have an AWESOME day/night!)  
-Kairi**


	5. 4: The Perks of Being Cole

**Sorry for the long wait, guys. Hope you enjoy today!**

* * *

_4. The Perks of Being Cole_

Cole Mitsuhide turned his back, his body tense with the strain of keeping his cool, although inside he was ready to blow up with so many feelings that they'd paint the room fine shades of red and pink. His hands slammed down on the long table behind him, rattling the knives and Tupperware set out from last night's dinner, the macaroni and meaty insides unaffected but their containers shaking with the force of his inhuman shove. His shoulder blades protruded out the back of his black T-shirt. Biting his teeth together to suck in the anger ready to pour out him any second now, he dug his nails into the laminated wood. Cole closed his eyes and took a deep breath before he turned back around to face her.

"If you left me," he said, his voice full of emotion that was powered both by anger and hurt, "I wouldn't be able to live." He swallowed, hard. His body felt too heavy. His knees felt weak. _I couldn't do it, _he thought, taking a deep breath again. This was so hard to do.

Her blue eyes, glassed over with tears ready to spill across her makeup and run black racehorses down her face with the stimulant of her mascara, were full of sorrow, sorrow that made it even harder to keep his own inside. Her red lips bobbed, her chin trembling, as she took a few steps forward towards him, outstretching her hands. In the seemingly effortless action, more tendrils of her light honey-colored hair escaped from the loose bun tied at the nape of her neck, whisping them into her eyes so she'd have to brush them away before she could grab his hands. Her eyes leaked the tears that she struggled to contain. Surprisingly, no mascara ran—yet.

Her hands were warm and soft around his. Cole clutched tightly at her, fearing that if he let her go, she'd run away from him—then what? Where would he go from there? Heaven, maybe. Living without her would be just too…

His heart stung already.

"Please," he whispered, voice cracking. She started to cry harder. "Don't leave me."

"I'm sorry," she breathed, sniffing hard to contain her emotions, but to no avail they escaped. She reached up to wipe away stray tears from under her eyes with the back of one hand, disconnecting their fingers for a long lost moment. Cole held his breath. "But I have to go. You know I can't stay here."

In a moment of weakness, he gave into his weak legs, breaking down to his knees hard enough to crack against the floor and cause pain. He didn't care; he was so distraught that he wrapped his arms around her waist and buried his face in her stomach, hiding from the world. He only came back up a second later to ask, "But what about the baby?" referring to the thing that was supposed to be formulating inside of her stomach at that very moment. She reached down, tears streaking, and laced her fingers through his hair.

"I'm sorry," she said to him, and Cole's own face grew wet. He buried his face in her belly again. "But I can't stay with you." He heard her voice from the inside and out, and it broke him to pieces. "After everything…"

He jumped back up to his feet, grabbing her face between his hands. The rage was back, the horror, the agony, the disbelief at saying such a thing to him making him want to do seven million horrible things to her, starting with biting her face off—but that wasn't going to happen. Not here. Instead, he swallowed his pride, and holding her tear-streaked face, made himself believe every word he was saying, stinging her eyes with his own, and said, "I couldn't ever let you go. I'm in love with you."

She sniffed, lip bobbing. "I was in love with you, too, once. But after what you did—"

Her words were unfinished, for Cole had descended upon her mouth with his own, pressing forcibly and eagerly against her lips. He laced his arms around her back, obliging her own hands with nowhere else to go but onto his biceps. She was struck dumb by the heady wealth of his kiss. Cole kissed her mouth, then transcended down to her chin, aiming for her throat while his heart navigated him. He was a soldier underneath its command. A soldier, it seemed, with serious problem with being true to his wife.

"Cole—" she gasped, and it was over.

_"CUT!"_

Cole pulled away from her the second the loud shout reverberated the large room, tossing her away as if she was vermin. He put as much distance as humanly possible between he and her, backing up so he leaned against the artificial counter behind his body, this time actually steaming with real irritation. His head snapped towards Mr. Grayburd.

His performing arts teacher loped forward, paper in hand that no doubt had the script printed on it in Times New Roman, wearing his traditional tan pressed pants that were ironed too flat. His tucked-in blue and white button down shirt had a big stain from his lunch written over the breast pocket where he normally kept an extra pen, but the man with the crazy salt-and-pepper 'do that went bald over the top of his head decided he'd better not soil his pens. Though Mr. Grayburd had a strange appearance, his kooky, strange naivety made him one of Cole's favorite teachers. He hobbled over in his dark loafers, waving around the script, and said with great enthusiasm, "His name is Jacobs in the play, Miss Miller! Jacobs! Though Cole is a _darling _name, you have to work by the script, otherwise we shall confuse those who watch on opening night!"

"My apologies, Mr. Grayburd…"

It was bad enough that Abby Miller, the bitch of the Oppenheimer College, got the lead role for this play alongside Cole—of all things, as his _wife, _when he could barely even stand the sight of her. It was worse that every day they practiced this for the big event later down the road—the one that would have tens of hundreds of agents attending when they showcased this in the Ninjago City auditorium—she screwed _something _up. Something that made rehearsal go bad. And then, since Mr. Grayburd thought she was so damn cute, he let her off with a warning. Uh, hel_lo, _sorry to burst your bubble, but they'd been practicing for over two months now, and every rehearsal he let her off the hook. That's got to be at least 200 warnings.

Cole dragged his hand down his face and watched Mr. Grayburd turn to him, animatedly waving around that clump of paper of his, smiling wide and showing his crooked-toothed smile. A light stubble of gray and white ran across his face. The man, it seemed, never had anything to frown about, even when the two-hundred-and-first mistake of this production had been made; his lack of pessimism was some sort of tactic to keep all the actors for this play in high spirits. Every day, Cole showed up to the rehearsal room with a bright attitude, but the second that Grayburd ordered he and Abby to commence a secluded scene where it was just the two of them, a storm cloud rolled over him.

It wasn't that Cole was just being a jerk because he didn't want to be making out raunchily with a girl that he wasn't familiar with. It was Abby's attitude. She, out of everyone going to the Marty Oppenheimer College for Performing Arts, was the most bitchy, evil, backstabbing, wenchy, unforgiving human being that Cole had ever come across. He was still trying to figure out if she was human or part devil with the way she acted, carrying around a posse of airheaded girls at her coattails like a high school diva, dropping them the minute they did something she didn't like. Often, that would be something as insignificant as wearing the wrong brand of perfume or too much lip gloss or even wearing a skirt that was one-half-inch away from the _supershort and revealing _wardrobe criteria that her followers had to maintain. Oh, and the overkill consequences for doing something Abby didn't like? She'd spread lie after lie after reputation-damaging lie about you, whispering giddily that you were a whore or you ate fast food or things that were far worse than Cole wanted to say. She was _nasty. _Her ugly personality was far worse than a person that Cole could forgive for being cunning or harsh, like Seiko; Seiko wasn't _mean, _at least not to the unlimited way Abby was. She was just sarcastic and had a lot to say about things, but she wasn't the wretched that was Abby-wretched. Cole had, over the years, learned to love Seiko a little bit. But he swore to any god that would listen: Abby Miller was unlovable.

Her clothing, too, violated several school laws, but nobody cared to call her on it. She wore shirts that revealed too much of her large (and, by Cole's assumptions, totally fake with plastic surgery) chest and skirts that couldn't cover enough of her ass, so her panties were always hanging out. Cole hated how some of his friends would stop and gawk as she shimmied past, her stupid bleach-white smile gleaming against her tan while smiling at her group of friends. She was the leader of her five-person enclave that varied members from week to month, according to who pissed her off and who she just got _bored _with. If she got bored with her friends, she'd flick them away like a mere fly. She treated people like objects, easily disposed of, easily replaceable with someone new; the Oppenheimer was booming with people to choose from. Everyone in Ninjago with a performing career came _here _instead of trying one of those cheap knock-off colleges that the government tried to establish in order to stop the huge waiting line for the Oppenheimer's enrollment. Each of those places, with millions of dollars floating down the drain with them, failed. Finally, they just ordered that they expand and enlarge the Oppenheimer's building, staff, courses, and so on. That was an issue that could've been easily fixed, but apparently you needed to take the hard way through before you made the last-ditch effort that actually succeeded.

Aside from being ruled according to Abby Miller's tastes, the Oppenheimer was, well, the place where Cole wanted to be most. Though his failures at the School still haunted him, his attempts to sing and dance pushing him under water, he found that he was only failing because he was being placed in the wrong _subject_ of the School's offered courses. Lou Mitsuhide, his father, had wanted Cole to become a singer/dancer, but Cole hadn't inherited those genes from his father. Despite that, it seemed that the unlikely really _did _tend to happen—Cole found his passion in an area not too far from it: Acting.

Acting was, to Cole, a second language. It was what he knew he was supposed to do with his life. When he portrayed a character from a script he was given, he'd been told (by many people who'd worked on the scripts) that he "_transformed_ into the person he was playing and _believed _in them so much that it was like watching their representation of the character jump off the page and come to life." Praise like that, plus great reviews, got Cole a very, _very _long way.

It started off with acting classes. Cole excelled at them, exceeding standards and being transferred from one class to another because he passed it so quickly. He was soon being cast in big-time plays as leading and secondary leading roles, stealing the spotlight, taking pictures with people after the play who begged him for just one photo. Cole didn't come into this field _asking _for the fame. He came into it out of interest, then out of passion for the sport. But it was obvious that his skills were blossoming into far bigger buds than he had thought before he'd come into it. Suddenly, it wasn't just being cast in school performances. It was being cast in performances that had nothing to _do _with the school and just other play producers hearing about him from all over Ninjago and asking him for his acceptance of becoming part of their show. It was only late in his second year at the Oppenheimer College when those openings began popping up. Under the encouragement of his father, Cole had hired an agent to organize that stuff, but quickly dropped it for the comfort of self-managing himself until he graduated. But Cole's fame didn't stop at stage fabrications and repeated plotlines like _Romeo and Juliet _and the tragic interpretation of _Anna Franco. _Soon, he was getting calls from _real people who worked on TV shows, _asking him if he wanted to guest star on one of their episodes. Granted, they weren't big-name shows like "Friends" or "The Big Bang Theory;" most of them were B-movie low production cost displays, but Cole was reviewed by watchers that he sparked up some of the episodes he popped into. Sometimes he played the angry customer who the waiter—one of the main characters, usually—spilled a malt on. Sometimes he was the hot guy that one of the main female protagonists flirted with/dated for one whole—or three—episode(s.) He hadn't even graduated yet, and he was already well-known. Magazine articles had been manufactured about the "Young Wonder that was slowly rising to fame."

All the publicity used to bug Cole because he liked to keep to himself. But after shifting in the sun for a time, he got used to it, and though he didn't _love _having all the attention, he was more comfortable with it now than he was when he began. That was the beauty of acting: it brought out the best in him.

Mr. Grayburd's insane grin spread wide across his stubbly cheeks. He strolled closer to Cole, who straightened his back in case he said anything about how Cole's anger might've peeked through his façade. Anger at Abby, BTW. But instead, he just made a jolly motion with his hands, hopping over his feet. "Cole!" He said. "Great job! I loved the tears! They work for you!" Giving a laugh, he lightly patted Cole's shoulder—he was way taller than Grayburd—and wandered past him. "Rehearsal is over for today! We covered all the scenes we needed to!" Reaching the metal door with a star on it at the end of the room behind their temporary kitchen for the scene, Grayburd called over his shoulder, "Miss Miller! Practice your confusion of names! Practice!"

Cole scrubbed his face. "Will do!" Abby cheerfully called from many, many feet in front of him. _That's fake, _he thought, seconds before the storm erupted with the shut of the golden-starred door.

There weren't many other performers in the room with them. The majority of the others had been dismissed when their parts had been practiced and their duties were, as of then, no longer needed. The only ones that lingered were ones that were quietly practicing together in the back corner of the room to avoid being called on for the same problems with their acting that they'd had earlier. Well, those people, and Cole's friend Sam, who sat in the back of the wide, empty practicing room (all the auditoriums were booked for today) with a textbook in hand, seeming more focused on his homework than actually watching Cole. Normally, following Cole after school hours meant one of two things: One, Sam was "trying to learn from Cole's expertise on how to get better at acting," or two, that he had nothing better to do until his old man got home to unlock the front door of his house. Sam couldn't afford a dorm in the Oppenheimer, so he stayed at his father's house, but liked to keep out of the geezer's way for as long as he could. When Cole glanced over at him, all he could see was shaggy cut dirty blonde hair on the top of his head, an ankle crossed over a knee, and a mechanical pencil tapping furiously against the open textbook. He wasn't exactly taking this experience to the _learning _level, was he?

Abby's cheery face dropped the mask the minute the door closed. By this time, the practicing performers had stopped their mini rehearsals to watch and stare. Yeah, Cole Mitsuhide had made it no secret that he strongly disliked Abby Miller and her horrendous attitude. Everybody in school _knew _that he couldn't stand her—including Abby herself, who until that point had made several attempts to flirt with him and take home the most successful student at the Oppenheimer at the time. She'd said to plenty of people how interested she was in him, how cute a couple they'd be, and on _purpose, _too, so that everyone would hear it, spread the news, and hope that it came back to him so that he'd know he was wanted. Her ultimate plan must've been that Cole was a sucker for knowing someone was interested in him and would've gone crawling to her company, flirting until they finally became an item. Unfortunately, Cole had already known of her rotten ego, and had not exactly respectfully declined it.

Since he made point that he wouldn't have interest in an evil bitch like her, Abby had stone-cold, flat out _hated _him back. Not that it bothered him. Cole would never be bothered by that. It only sucked big time that they ended up being in the same acting rotational, which for her strengthened the tension and created a competitive ground, while Cole was totally at ease and oblivious to it. It was fine for him to hate her but not let that get in the way of his acting. Sorrily, that idea had caught on to Abby, too, and though she still tried to stir up trouble with him all the time, she didn't let it bleed into her acting as much as she used to.

Abby's stone cold face made point to curl her lip while putting a hand on her waist. She looked disgusted—to try and offend Cole, no doubt—at the idea that he'd just touched her, kissed her, and pretended to lust for her. Her eyes flamed with loathing. "Great," she spat, making her words sharp knives, "now I'm going to have to go disinfect my mouth, face, _and _body over and over again just to get your foul germ off me."

Cole rolled his eyes, letting the comment bounce off him. He took note that the room had gone silent but pretended not to notice. He instead left the counterside to go find his jacket, hanging over a plastic lawn chair that Grayburd had brought in here for a prop earlier. "You should take a bath in hand sanitizer," he suggested coolly, pretending he was casually referencing a movie title to someone. He lifted the jacket, back to Abby, so he could slide his arms into the warmth of the black leather. His eyes didn't have to turn around to know she was seething with rage. "I hear that it makes your skin soft."

Cole then marched towards Sam, who'd already begun to frantically pack his things on announcement that the day was over, not wanting to hold up the show. _You're smart, _Cole thought. _You know just how bad I want to leave and NOT have to face this bitch any more. Thanks_. He swiped his gray backpack, leaning against the leg of Sam's chair, from the ground onto his shoulder, then flipped his hair out of his eyes so he could see. When he turned back around, Sam rising at his side, he noticed that Abby was still perched atop the platform they'd performed on, her hands fisted at her sides and her face gnarled into a long scowl, killing him slowly with her brown eyes. Cole raised a hand and pointed at her. "Continue," he said wisely, "and your face is gonna freeze like that."

Without another word, Cole turned out of the room, knowing Sam was at his heels. He could hear the other lingering actors and actresses hiding their snickers behind him, trying not to laugh. Cole, personally, wasn't cracking a smile. He wished that she'd just keep her face like that. Then she'd be showing an eternal mask of what her real insides were like, and everybody could see was a horrible person she was.

Having seen his share of monsters and demons, he was pretty sure she ranked up in a class that had Eloquim the Deadly, a long-defeated Shadow Dancer, in there somewhere.

They'd left the performance room many doors down the hallway by the time Sam actually spoke. Sam was the type of kid that fit in to the crowd but sometimes looked like he didn't want to be there and would rather be isolated than surrounded by them. By no means, though, had he been a student that the "most 'popular'" entertainers going to this school would want to include to their groups. The Oppenheimer, in a way, was a parallel of high school: social groups never died. Not even in college.

That was why Cole had reached out to him. Cole was in no one social group here; he was friends with (almost) everybody, had nothing bad to say about anyone (unless you're Abby) and tried to include everyone he could, even helping the people that had a hard time fitting in by showing them to some other people who had the same traits. Like he used to do when he was a ninja, Cole observed the skills and faults of others before taking action. He could name off a lot of people that he'd personally helped fit in better with his generosity and kindness—they needed a little nudge from someone who was willing to help, and Cole's desire to make a difference in people's lives had never been satisfied completely by being a ninja. So he reached out and helped people get comfortable, helped them find a social group they could fit into, make friends. Sam once called him the "Oppenheimer's Honorary Social Worker."

Sam was one of those people when he'd appeared on campus in what was Cole's second year. He looked overwhelmed, unsure what to do; Cole watched him float around for a while, trying to make friends, and eventually become someone who people knew and liked for his humor and his heart, but Sam had never really looked like he knew just exactly _how _he was supposed to fit in. Cole felt sympathetic knowing that he was, in a way, exactly like that. So, outstretching a hand, Cole had brought Sam into his life—and planned on keeping him there.

Sam had already known who Cole was the minute that the former ninja stepped onto the abandoned side steps of the Oppenheimer's fourth large building exit, a place for once empty of people. Sam had been sketching in his notebook the picture of a small bird that he'd been feeding pieces of his sandwich, hopping around at his feet with eagerness to have another piece. Cole had been astonished at the great detail on just _blue lined paper_, and couldn't help but blurt out, "That's freakin' amazing. Where did you learn how to do that?"

Sam had looked embarrassed. The bird got scared and flew a few feet away, but not far away enough to sacrifice his chances of finishing off Sam's lunch; the other boy had quickly tried to close the notebook when Cole, a supposed popular just because of his status with acting, had stepped onto the same white stair Sam was sitting on. His eyes went round when Cole reached out his hand. "Can I see it?" he'd asked.

"Um," Sam had stuttered. He'd looked scared of Cole. Because of Cole's curse, the curse of an immortal vampire, he was able to smell the worry and fear coming off the boy, but Cole's smile had reassured him, somehow, with the inhuman ability.

"I won't ruin it. I promise. I'm not like that."

Cole had been admiring the handiwork after Sam passed along the book when he heard the shier man barely gasp out, "But you're one of _them."_

"No, I'm not," Cole had immediately said, tasting already what Sam was feeding him. "I might be good at what I do, but I don't believe that makes me _superior _to everyone else or any of that bullshit. I don't believe in social gain. I also don't believe in harassment, so you don't have to worry about me hurting you or ripping up your drawing." Cole had passed back the notebook, a soft smile of welcome crossing his face. "Don't worry, kid. I don't bite. You're safe with me." He'd added a wink to that one.

Cole had gotten to know Sam a little bit more from that conversation. Sam had come to the college after graduating from the School. He wanted to be a musician and singer/songwriter, but also had a small passion for painting and fine arts like his late mother had that kept his hands busy when he wasn't playing the piano. Sam's father was a middle-aged man who adored his son but had a slight alcohol problem ("I know just how you feel," Cole had said, remembering what Lou had been like after Cole's mother died) that kept him away most of the evenings. Sam was the youngest of four, the older three being all girls who used to pick on him, but loved him anyway. Each were married or off in college too, some with kids and one without. Sam's best friend was his dog, Jericho, who Cole had met a couple of times. To him, Sam seemed like a normal, everyday kid, with a slightly dappled face and shaggy, dirty dark blonde hair, thick eyebrows, and wide green eyes.

Sam Short soon became one of Cole's best friends, next to Jay Walker, Zane Montgomery, Kai Smith, and Lloyd Garmadon. Even if he didn't see two of the four of those people anymore, he still considered them his best friends; billions of times he'd tried to reach out to Kai but had only hit dead ends when the fire ninja denied speaking to him, blocked his number, and refused to serve him when Cole came to _Four Weapons _by surprise. Cole could sense there was a lot going on with Kai. He knew it wasn't the egotistical hothead trying to be an ass and keep him out of his life just to be a jerk about it. Something was wrong. When Cole spoke to Zane about it, Zane said that it was probably that Kai wasn't ready to see them yet. Something was holding Kai back.

But the million dollar question was: _What? _

Five years seemed a reasonable enough time frame to recover. What else was keeping Kai from taking the hands that Jay, Zane, and Cole reached out to him? One time, Kai's voicemail had even said, though it was long ago, "Hey, it's Kai…I'm probably busy so leave me a message. But if you're Jay, Cole, Zane or Ll—" his voice had caught on Lloyd's name, "_Lloyd_—I'm sorry, but please don't." That voicemail lasted for two or three years until it was finally changed to "Just leave Kai a message." So, without the prompter telling him _not _to message, Cole had left a zillion voicemails, overflowing his inbox next to Zane's and Jay's frantic mails. The fight had seemed hopeless—until one day, Kai finally answered him. And what a day _that _was.

"Hello?"

Kai had sounded groggy. Tired. Worked up, but tired. Cole had almost cried at the sound of the voice he hadn't heard for four years, asking him a million questions in rapid fire over the phone, finally excited that maybe Kai was ready to start talking to them all again—but in a moment's spur, Kai quickly cut off everything his former leader had to say. "Cole," he'd gruffly said, voice changing from tired to tired, angry, and agitated. Cole had paused. "Just stop calling me, okay? Just—just _stop._"

And then, the line went dead.

Cole held onto that for a while, angry at Kai for abandoning the team—but then he realized that Kai wasn't abandoning them. He realized that Kai was probably impacted more by all the tragedy the ninja had gone through during that long time span of lies upon meeting Eloquim than he'd let on. All those hardships, the pain, watching your friends die, being _dead, _fighting, trying to win, losing, loving without being loved back, the frustration, the hurt, the agony. It all had to have built up on top of Kai, and when Kaos the Deadly, the half-breed of Shadow Dancer that replaced Eloquim after his defeat, revealed to them that everything that had happened to them wasn't real…that it was just a _dream, _an illusion…Kai had snapped. It had been too much for him. He couldn't take it. Cole sensed he wasn't the same after that, but was too scared to call it to attention. He regretted that now.

So Cole wasn't mad at Kai anymore. He was stepping back, letting Kai have his space, and hoping that the fire ninja would one day return a call.

And as for Lloyd…They'd never really been close enough to form a "call me once a month" relationship. He was keeping tabs on the kid through Zane, who talked to him all the time, and through his younger sister Seiko, but never actually talked to Lloyd over the phone or through visitation but once. That conversation had been spacy and awkward for both of them. And the last time that Cole had _seen _him was something like two years ago at a wedding, so his last images of him weren't really up to date. Regardless, Cole still kept an eye out on him; the rascal had to be causing trouble sometimes, didn't he? After all, the little bugger had _sworn himself off candy. _Candy! His favorite thing in the world! He'd apparently lost taste for sugary things as time wore on his body, which didn't make sense because Cole's favorite thing was _still _chocolate cake. No way he'd give that up. Cake was too important to be abandoned. Like his brothers.

Cole was always watching out for his friends. That was who he was: loyal 'till the end.

"The look on her face was priceless," Sam said, shattering the mental-run through in Cole's mind. He was brought to the present, where he found he'd already reached the large exit doors of the Oppenheimer's school—the doors off the west wing, because that's where he parked today. Cole knew this ungodly place, larger than any college he'd ever seen, like the back of his hand. He must've been directing himself while he was deep in thought.

Cole shoved open one of the spring-loaded doors. Sam followed closely behind him, just the place where the thought of Abby should be. "Agreed, bro," Cole said, the sunshine from outside eating into his eyes. He jogged down the steps beside Sam while trying to remember just where he parked his hand-me-down truck from his father as a _Congratulations on getting into my college of choice, son! _gift. "She thinks she's being witty, but I think she's being a douche."

Sam snorted. "Can you classify girls as douches?" he wondered aloud, following Cole across the tar towards the tan truck hiding in the back row, far from him. The walk didn't wind him; he was still as fit as he was five years ago. Maybe fitter, if that was possible.

"I don't know if it's considered 'legal' or not, but I just did." Cole dug his keys out of his jacket pocket. The large parking lot spread far beyond them. They passed shiny cars, old cars, new-ish cars, and cars that should've died long ago. "She acts like she's queen, and it _pisses me off." _

Sam laughed. "I can tell," he said. "I'm also using deductive reasoning because you've told me so a million times."

Cole shrugged. "I hate her. I really do." _Practically as much as I hated Kaos, _he thought darkly, scouring the lines for the small blue car that Sam drove to and from school every day, but couldn't seem to find it. Where'd the kid park?

"So hey," Sam said quickly, indicating they were close to his car and he wanted to say something before Cole made it to his, halfway across the parking lot. Cole turned to look into his straightforward eyes with the idea that he was going to have to let him down to whatever he was about to ask. "Jaycee Lin asked me to come with her club members for a _Glee _club evening out at the Starboard café, and told me to bring a friend. You interested?"

_I can't sing, _Cole grumbled to himself, _I've told you that. _He felt a little strange knowing that he'd love to come and support Sam, but wouldn't be able to hit the right notes if he was asked to sing a line out of Tom Petty's handbook. At least this time he wouldn't have to let him down with an excuse. Cole smiled reassuringly at him, but added a hint of regret in there. "I'd love to, Sam, but I can't," he said.

"What's your excuse?" Sam asked jokingly, nudging him. Sam never seemed to mind it when Cole said he didn't want to come—in a way, he think Sam understood, but was trying to see if one day he'd give it a shot. Cole admired that.

"Well," he said, and couldn't keep the smile off his face or the beam out of his voice, "I get to go visit my daughter today, so I'm booked."

Sam was the only one that Cole had told about his five-year-old daughter, Rie Tanaka, but somehow, somebody had overheard through eavesdropping techniques and had spread it around the school. A lot of rumors about his daughter had popped up, until Cole had directly announced to everyone that his daughter was not, in fact, the child of a hooker, or the baby of a one-night stand he'd gotten from a party. He told them that he loved her very, very much, and that his life was not _any _of their business, and that, in fact, many people at his age had children. So they had all better stop making their own stories up about him or they'd want to transfer out of Oppenheimer. It sounded like a threat now that Cole thought about it, but at the time, he'd just been tired of people ripping on his daughter. He really _did _love her. With all his heart. He loved her more than chocolate cake.

Sam, ever supportive, grinned from ear to ear. "That's great!" he exclaimed.

Rie lived with her mother and Cole's previous teammate, Nya, who was married to Jay now. (Long story.) Since Cole was busy a lot, visitations had been cut minimally, but whatever chance he got, he was always heading over to their home in west Ignacia to spend a few hours with his baby girl. Everything he did was for her. The money he earned by working on jobs, acting in shows and plays, he split according to what bills he had to pay and donated some of the money to Nya to help her out. Jay and Nya seemed to be doing great on money, but Cole wanted so spend some of his portions on her, and couldn't always be there to provide her with the new toothbrush or the new blankets or whatever she needed or wanted, so he opted for something a little better than nothing.

"Yeah," Cole said.

"It's been a while since you last visited. She's gonna be stoked," Sam said. Though Sam hadn't ever actually met Rie, he claimed that he felt close to her through the way Cole spoke about her. He seemed genuine when he asked how she was doing, and not just asking to stir up conversation. He wanted to know.

"I hope so," Cole said.

Hidden behind a van, Cole hadn't exactly seen Sam's car until he noticed that his friend wasn't there with him anymore. He looked a couple of steps back to see him standing at the beak of his small, mousy car with a cheesy grin. His solute from forehead to the air made Cole roll his eyes in a friendly way. "Enjoy your evening!" Sam said, not sounding like he was disappointed for not having Cole's company. Cole waved.

"See you tomorrow," he said happily, and turned away while Sam moved to the driver's side of his car.

Was Cole happy with his life now? He was pursuing the job of his dreams, frequently saw (some of) his old friends, had a pretty stable lifestyle, patched his relationship with his sister, lived in the same house as his father while he looked for his own apartment after "losing" his dorm in the Oppenheimer, and tried to be the best father he could to his daughter. Though he was no longer a ninja, Cole had a pretty well-strung life. He didn't have any serious problems, only bumps in the road, like that damned Abby or Kai's disconnect. He felt at ease instead of every day wondering who was going to die this time, wondering who he'd have to fight, what he'd lose doing it. Cole was at peace with himself for the first time in his life.

He'd never been happier.

But, as a wise man once said: _All good things must come to an end._

* * *

**_So that's _****what Cole has been up to! Now, off to Jay! (I'm sorta done with his POV...We shall see.)**

**Go have an awesome day/night!**


	6. 5: One Big Happy Family

_5. One Big Happy Family_

"Was that SUPPOSED to happen?

Jay Walker listened to the loud roar of the car's engine, fitfully denying that he'd spent hours trying to fix it with its scream of disgruntlement. He felt like all this time he'd wasted trying to locate where exactly the raw groans had been coming from just totally went down the drain. Having started at noon this evening, he felt horribly robbed. He groaned and, his back pressed against a small bed on wheels that he used to slide under the car's underbelly, rolled himself out by shoving his hands against the edge of the car.

Standing above him next to where he emerged from, a wrench glued to his hand by dirt and oil, his wife Nya leaned into the driver's door of the old blue jalopy, one hand on the ignition key and the other on the hip of the door. She looked down at him with a thin, plucked brown eyebrow, her chin tucked against her chest. Her dark brown hair was pulled in a long ponytail behind the back of her head, loose flyaways tucked in clumps behind her ears, and her forehead tuckered. From this angle, Jay could even see the strained curve of her upper lip parting from her lower one in frustration.

"I don't even know," Jay admitted in an angry breath, tossing down the wrench to the floor in utter disgust for the thing. He would've scrubbed the heels of his hands on his eyes, but he had oil and slick all over him, and taking a visit to the doctor for copper poisoning didn't seem like such a hot idea. All he wanted was a shower, a nap, and to leave this stupid car behind, but a deal was a deal: he told the owner it would be fixed by noon tomorrow. That was the upbringing and the breakdown with Jay's and Nya's couple-owned business out the garage of their two story suburban home. They usually made ridiculous time limits to please their customers and keep them off the grounds of Haruko Tap, their competition company in town that kept trying to run their business, ElectroTech Repairs [Electronics, Cars, Computers, anything you can find—We'll fix!], off the block. He would say that...oh...97% of the time, Jay's customers left happy.

BUT he might've overdone it this time. Normally when there was a car that came in for fixing—which hardly EVER happened—it was just a little twitch with the battery or an oil change or something quick that Jay could fix on the fly. No biggie. THIS car, however, had technological issues that somehow HAD to be integrated into its corporative psyche, otherwise Jay would've figured it out by now. It was making weird noises, and that just wasn't...UGH.

Nothing he tried worked.

"Maybe you can call your dad and ask him to come over," Nya suggested, taking her hands away from the ignition and stepping back, closing the car door. (Don't worry; it was on a car jack so Jay didn't get hit in the face with it.) She had only decided to come out here and help him approximately twenty-five minutes ago, mostly because Jay didn't want to ask her to move around too much and get herself hurt while she was helping him. Her daily distractions often kept her from being able to be as assistive as she used to be. Their three children knew not to make a fuss when their parents were in the garage. It was some sort of unsaid law that you didn't bother Mom or Dad when they were out here that they all must've talked over during playtime before dinner or something. None of them had ever bothered Jay or Nya when the door connecting their kitchen and the garage separated the parents and their lovely babies—which was a good thing, but maybe a bad thing too in case one of them happened to hurt themself or something bad like—

You're goin' into protective dad mode, Jay, he told himself, squaring his shoulders briefly for a second. Calm it down a little. After all, they probably got their brains from Nya. Goodness knew they didn't get it from Jay. He was the parent that worried sick over each of them when they were asleep in their beds at night, worrying that maybe something bad was happening to them like a nightmare, or maybe they accidentally had rolled off the bed, whacked their head on the floor too hard, and were unconscious. He worried over them when they played too roughly, and when they ran ahead of him when he and Nya took them on walks. He overdid the protective parent role. If he had it his way, he'd stick 'em all in bubble wrap and keep them in his sight at all times.

Jay sat up, careful not to hit his poor head on the car again, so he could bend out his knees and dangle his dirty hands between his legs, sighing out all the hot air he had pent up inside of him. Though he swore there was none of the guaranteed padding on the friggin' bed, his back didn't hurt as bad as it did the other day. Hey, maybe I'm building immunity to it! He thought, trying to raise his spirits. "Yeah," he agreed finally, his voice heavy. "I should do that. He'd know what to do." But the itch of knowing he didn't complete his task still ached on his shoulders.

Nya reached down and gently ran a hand over his hair, twisting her finger over his ear. She looked amused at him, telling him, "You'll figure it out. Just take a break, rest a little, call your dad—and THEN play with Onyx. He misses you."

Jay tilted his chin up at her, twisting his head sideways so he could look at her, so much taller than him from down here. Nya's hazel eyes gleamed at him with affection that built up over at least seven years of mutual love between them. A love that he was always so eager to reciprocate. Being with Nya was all Jay could live for—well, that, and his kids. He could practically feel his own heart tripping over itself as he tried to think of what to say, before finally managing to stutter, "I suppose I could sit down and play with him and his trucks for a while."

Nya smiled brightly. Her smile could light up a thousand cities all across Ninjago—nothing would ever put out her beauty or the glorious way she outshined the sun on a day where baking heat wanted to cook them all into toast. Even when they were old and graying like Jay's parents were, he knew that he would always, always, always have the strongest feelings towards her, no matter what she might've done in the past. Besides, look at Misako and Damon. Rumor had it that Misako had gone to Sensei Wu after Damon turned to the dark side (where they surely provided cookies) and for as far as the conversations with Lloyd had gone many, many years ago during the night after the Overlord was defeated, they'd gone somewhere. He remembered that night, thick as blood: All of them had stayed over at Misako and Damon's house, because A) they had the biggest place that would fit all of their worn-out ninjaness, and B) the Bounty hadn't been retrieved from the Dark Island and re-patched yet. It was pitch black in the bunk room that Jay had shared with Cole and Zane during the times that he had no recollection of his triumphs. There was only one bunk bed, but there were mats sprawled over the floor for Kai and Cole, since there were o other guest rooms. Not that they would've used it anyway…

Lloyd had had his own room, but as tired as he should've been, he stayed up with them a little late after Misako had advised they all hit the hay just so he could talk to them for a while. Everyone was tired, but they wanted to talk, like they normally did every night before they went to bed. It was tradition that no one wanted to break. Lloyd had told them what it felt like to feel only light coursing through his veins, feel himself radiating from his innards out. The others told him what it was like to be taken over by darkness. It felt awful, like someone was reaching inside of your throat and twisting your guts with their fist, depositing junk in there that filled you up, some kind of jiggly purple gelatin. Jay wanted to throw it all up, but he couldn't get rid of it. Until Lloyd saved them all, of course.

Somehow their conversation had turned focus from the Final Battle to Sensei, Misako, and Damon, and how Lloyd was convinced that Misako had an affair with Sensei after Damon flipped the pancake. His reasoning was that his mother had expressed to her son that she "once loved him," and as if that wasn't proof enough, she'd claimed that she should've chosen Wu. Lloyd felt guilty for overhearing that, but told his friends all about it. The looks that Wu and Misako exchanged usually had enough in them that made Jay want to smile at their happiness but then backtrack at the betrayal it must've meant. All of Garmadon's wrongdoings must've been a real turn-off for her. So, automatically, she must've picked the next best thing: His brother.

Nya'd done the same thing, once, with Jay. It was such a long time ago, and it really hurt Jay to think about, but he realized after a lot of thinking… Even if she did sleep with his brother, his leader, Jay couldn't stop loving her. She was the love of his life. He'd go back to her in a heartbeat.

Jay and Nya's relationship had been hitting some pretty rocky notes when she did what she did. They were fighting a lot, they couldn't agree on anything, couldn't physically touch each other anymore—it had appeared that their burning-hot relationship was at its end. One night, a big fight between the two while the others were sleeping cracked the vein that was already scarred, releasing hell as she finally demanded of him that she just wanted a break from him, that she just couldn't take it anymore. She said she needed time. So, Jay, furious but also scarred deeply, let her go. He remembered when she stomped out of their bedroom that night, telling him angrily that she'd just go sleep somewhere else, the sounds of her stomps receding down the hallway had been one more crack on his heart. Though they were at a bad spot, Jay didn't love her any less. His beliefs knew they'd work out whatever was causing them to disagree so frequently. He knew that by letting her walk out that door, he was giving her up, and they would never be the same again if he let that happen. But he also knew that he wouldn't give up trying to get her back. He'd have done anything for her, to make her come back to him. He couldn't live without her. His plan was to let her mull it over through the night—but, well, things hadn't gone according to plan.

Nya had found console with Cole, who was up late in the night on the deck of the Bounty, catching himself some air. And apparently, that is where things had sprung from bad-but-fixable to our-relationship-is-so-hooped. She'd adopted Cole as her stress-reliever and had taken him to places that Jay thought was only available for him. But, he guessed, things weren't really going so swell.

All in all, Cole had ended up ending it when he was ridden by guilt, and a whole bunch of other details that Jay really couldn't remember in his heartbroken-induced coma where he still had the ability to function, just not with purpose. Their little one-night stand had eventually kept creeping back into Jay's life, never letting him forget the ugly love triangle when a possessed-ish Misako had revealed to all of them that Jay was not the father of the pregnancy he thought he owned. Nope, it was actually his teammate. Good to know. I think I'm just gonna go die over here, okay bro?

But here Jay was, so many years later, and back with her in every way that excluded Cole's white romance with her. By now, Jay thought that Cole was over her after the horrible, horrible heartbreak he'd suffered when he realized that he didn't get the girl. Which he was totally supportive of, because Cole wanted Nya to pick Jay. He wouldn't have lived with himself if she hadn't.

Either way, to finally conclude that the Jaya-Coya love triangle was officially dismissed, there were bands over the ring fingers of Nya's and Jay's hands, bonding them together for the rest of their beautiful lives.

The wedding had been pretty laid back. They held it in a park, renting out a gazebo and sheltered picnic areas for their guests. Beautiful sakura trees were surrounding them, making everything so much more special. Jay and Nya hadn't wanted anything overly extravagant, because that was not what they were into, so their ceremony had been small with only their closest friends and family, and nothing had been too decorated. Just some stuff that they'd thrown together. Showy, large parties with hundreds of attendees were not the publicity that they were looking for, nor were the extremely expensive gowns for the maids of honor and the bride, of course; Nya picked what she thought was simple and clean, a white-lace over ivory dress with long sleeves. Her long, dark brown hair was twisted into a half-up bun, with curls tumbling down her shoulders, and her eyes—oh, her eyes!—were dewy and beautiful and so incredibly Nya that she hadn't looked like she faked herself out for her wedding day; she was so, so, so beautiful in her traditional dress that Jay had almost started crying at least four times in the middle of the ceremony. "Stop that," Nya had told him through laughter when they were holding hands, binding themselves together with vows, her own eyes showy with tears. "You're going to make me cry, too!" Her vocal plea had earned laughter from the small, exclusive rows of characters sitting outside beside them, watching Jay and Nya marry.

"I can't help it," he'd sniffled. "I love you so much." It was more of a comment he wanted to keep private, but he got 'awww's out of the crowd. Except from the droids. (Not including Wu.)

Sensei Wu, Misako, Damon, Ed, Edna, and Lou were all in the front row, beaming out at them with bright faces. The second row was dominated by Ming, Rikku, Yuki, Seiko Mitsuhide, Bokuyo, and one of Nya's friends. In the third and fourth row were some family from Jay and Nya's side; aunts and uncles and their children and cousins and people of that category. The fifth and sixth row had some old friends of Nya's and a few of Jay's waiting in the background. Nya's best friends, her maid of honor and the other two girls, had squealed a couple of times and destroyed the moment for Jay, but he still accepted them with Nya's package anyway. Initially picking this wedding and sending out invitations, Jay had picked Kai as his best man, but when the several messages to Four Weapons and a few drop-by attempts failed, he knew there was no way he'd be able to reach out to him. So, he picked three best men instead of deciding: Cole, Lloyd, and Zane, who proudly stood behind him and grinned from ear to ear all night. It hurt not to have Kai, his best friend, come to his wedding. That's not how he'd fantasized it seven years ago…

But after marrying her and walking down the aisle as people threw flower petals at them, hand in hand, Jay had spotted someone standing in the doorway of the gazebo, a tall hooded figure in a dark jacket, watching from afar. They'd been wearing jeans, leaning against the black wooden frame of the entrance, looking out at the ceremony from under the shade of his hood. Jay had only glimpsed the person before double taking in surprise. Nobody else saw the figure who remained there as Jay walked Nya down the aisle, but he saw plain as day—and it gave him the strongest hope he'd felt in a while—the gleam of a reddened scar down a pale face and a soft, crooked smile under the golden eyes of his best friend. Jay's heart had stopped. Kai had come to see. He just hadn't felt like alerting everybody else that he was present. When their eyes locked, Kai gave him a look that could be taken the way of close to tears or very proud. Jay took it as both. His smile had only sharpened when they stared at each other for that brief few seconds, so close they could have named how many buttons were on their jackets yet so far away from touching. No matter, it was life-changing to see him once again in that first year that Jay would have to learn again how to live without him: Though he dodged contact, Kai was still alive. He was okay.

It was the greatest wedding present ever.

He clung to that hope.

"C'mon, Mechanic Man," Nya said, reaching down to him despite his dirty hands, helping him up with the strength of a best friend and a lover. Jay plopped to his feet. "Let's go inside and get you cleaned up, shall we?"

Jay leaned over and kissed her nose. "Sure."

The inside of the house was, to put it lightly, struck by lightning. Toys scattered the tile floor, crayons were piled over the kitchen table, dolls were set up on the counter. Paper with senseless scribbles and abstract images was scattered across the room by the dozens. Was this some sort of way for the kids to strike against their parents being outside for so long? If it was, they might need to rethink just how long they can be out there—or how much trust they put in their kids when they expect them to be little angels when they're not being watched. In the other room, Jay could hear the wail of a baby who was just wailing to be running around, no doubt Onyx, who was always trying out his new happy feet.

Onyx James was Jay's youngest son so far down the road at just one year old, named after his dark honest eyes that usually stated guilt when he knew he'd done something wrong. He'd learned to walk not too long ago and was in love with the idea of motion, taking himself to the extremes when he realized if he could walk, he could also run. The house was his racetrack. Nya and Jay used to be able to sit on the couch in the living room in the evenings and sit down to watch Onyx tear up gravel as his tiny little feet pounded around, darting through the doorway connected to the kitchen that was connected back to the living room before making it to the staircase and turning right back around. He hadn't quite mastered those yet, but Jay's littlest son was determined to accomplish his goals, just like Nya. Onyx was, as she so astonishingly claimed, the child that Jay paid the most attention to and hogged from his mother. The small little boy was everything that Jay loved about parenting, from their first son, Noah, to their second daughter, Natille, all bundled into his third child. He was just about everything that Jay lived for: the smiles, the giggles, the creative play times, the first steps, the first words, the first smile, the first laugh. The list could go on forever, but you probably have only so much time to listen to him.

Stepping into the house, Jay felt like a supernatural whirlwind had attacked their home and destroyed the clean persona of how much time they usually spent cleaning it up after their three children—and the fourth pair of little feet that was always the ringleader of the messes. No doubt that this mess was the result of something she'd cooked up. Jay crossed his arms over his chest, pressing his lips together without intending to yell. Because, like always, Nya beat him to it.

"RIE!" she yelled, her voice skirting through the house and into the living room, where the kids were certainly playing since the kitchen got all messed up. Immediate silence fell over the Walker residence. "RIE TANAKA! GET IN HERE NOW!"

Nya normally used Rie's middle name on a daily basis, wandering around her daughter when she was playing with something and asking, "Whatcha up to, Rie Tanaka?" with a basket full of laundry pressed against her belly by one arm over its maw. A lot of times, Rie was always being called by first and middle names. But it was never too hard to distinguish the casual drop of "Hiya, Rie Tanaka" and the blistering shout of "RIE TANAKA!" She knew when she was in trouble.

They didn't really call her Rie Tanaka Walker. No, that would be a little too weird, and Jay didn't think that Cole, her father, would like that very much. Instead, they usually signed any papers or registered her into things as Rie Tanaka Mitsuhide, since Nya really didn't want to tape "Smith" on the back of her name. There weren't any hassles with custody over the daring little Rie. It was, sorta, a good thing that it was Cole, who didn't really get into verbal altercations over physical objects. He loved dropping by to visit. It was just…the way they were handling this worked. Cole would pop in sometimes to see her, nobody would have a problem with it. Cole and Jay were on good terms now. There wasn't any awkwardness anymore. They'd gotten over it.

Nya stomped past Jay after the little child that wouldn't come. Just so he wouldn't have to go on there to see her getting yelled at, Jay went to the sink and washed his hands of the oil slick, then bent down to start picking up some of the crayons and paper that Rie had left, destructed, across the floor that would kill him if he didn't see any of it. He really didn't like it when Nya yelled at the kids; he just wasn't the type of dad who wanted to use punishment to make them learn from their honest mistakes and on-purpose mistakes, in the way that Sensei Wu used to punish Jay and the others when they did something wrong. They weren't bad punishments, usually just training for six hours or no video games or having to clean the Bounty or dojo.

And here Jay was, five years later, a successful business owner, a father, and a husband in his mid-twenties. Looking back on all those punishments, he realized how naïve he was, thinking those punishments were the worst thing ever, that they were the end of the world, when he hadn't even seen the worst of the damage. To him, when he was that young, things had been so over-compensated. Things now that seemed so puny and unconventional had back then been way bigger than he saw them now, through new eyes that had seen an amount of days far different than the ones he could've ever imagined seeing. He had been ruled by small thoughts that didn't cover the grounds of his thoughts today. Bills, money, groceries, bills, customers, babies, his kids, laundry, family time, bills. Jay had never thought like that when he was younger.

It was frightening how much he'd changed, but empowering.

Jay had himself a stack of paper that would surely please the recycling company when he put it in the bin when he heard the pat-thumpy-pat-pat of tiny, bare feet running across the cold tile floor. Jay, crouched down to retrieve the scattered mines, looked up, his neck craning to look around the kitchen table, even though he already knew who it was. Onyx's chubby, bare legs flailed towards his father. He had nothing on but a white diaper, hopefully unsoiled, showing his chubby baby belly and arms in the broad chill of the room. A purple pacifier was stuffed into his lips. Jay saw a large grin peeking out from behind the quieter.

His heart lit up. Jay opened his arms to let his son, giving an excited squeal, come into his arms, being lifted from the ground and into the air by the lithe rise of Jay's body using his toned legs. He put his face into his baby's throat. "Hiya, buddy," he said against the soft cheer of a baby's skin.

Onyx sprouted a happy squeal again. Jay leaned back to look into his dark eyes, at the toothless smile around his pacifier. The round, chubby face of his baby-ness made Jay fall in love with him a million times over. He put his face back into his throat and asked, "Are you causing trouble? Huh? Are you causing trouble?" He blew hot air against the baby's shoulder, making a flatulence sound. Onyx screamed with giggles.

Jay continued to do so until he heard his name being called. Or, well, his other name.

"Daddy." Her tiny voice was flat. Natille appeared in the kitchen doorway, coming into the room with a doll clutched by the locks of her hair between her fingers. Natille was only three, cursed with Jay's hair and thin lips, blessed by Nya's hazel eyes. She came into the room in her small white "fairy," dress, as she liked to call it, that had short sleeves with poufy shoulders and a frilly hem of the skirt. She wandered to her father's legs and buried her face in them. Jay bent down, Onyx still in one arm, to wrap another arm around her and hug her from a crouch.

Natille was the serious one, the one that didn't laugh, the one that took things very acutely. She was scarily like Zane in the way that she stared at people without answering them, and then gave an answer that was not relative to the topic question at all, or one that really didn't answer the question in the first place. Her calm, unwavering demeanor scared Jay sometimes, because she hardly ever smiled and gave a death glare whenever she looked at people, even when she was just LOOKING and not intending to slaughter them with her eyes. Her voice usually was low-toned and flattened. She had a thing about her that hazardously seemed wise, wiser than a 3 year old SHOULD be. Jay had a scary feeling that she was smarter than him. But she was 3; what could she know, right?

That's not very convincing.

"Hi, honey." Jay kissed her ruffly mane of curls, holding her tight before letting her go. Natille's flat expression didn't change, but Jay knew she was happy he'd kissed her. His welcoming smile did nothing to coax out an emotion out of her, though. "Whatcha up to?"

"I wan' play dollies. Rie won' play dollies."

"What's Rie doing?"

"Lying to Mommy."

Jay tried not to smile at the blatant reason. "About what?"

"About doing this to tha kitchn." Natille's hard stare bore into Jay. "If she keeps lyin' like she lyin' all da time, she's gonna forget how to tell the truth." Well, she IS right there; Rie does lie to cover up her tracks a lot…Jay sighed, wishing that he knew how to stop the eldest child in the house from creating such a bad influence for the other kids. He kissed Natille's sweet cheek, stealing his mind away from it, while Onyx gave a random, happy squeak. He was the happy-go-lucky one, like Jay. Natille was the deadly side of Nya when she was pissed off.

"Tell you what, Munchkin," Jay said brightly, calling her by the nickname he'd always had for her since she was born. Natille stared. "I'll play dollies with you when we get this mess cleaned up, okay?"

"You haf to bee da boys then." Natille puckered her lower lip. "Rie is always da boys."

O…kay. Jay smiled anyway and kissed her forehead. "Go get the dollies set up, and when I'm done in here, I'll come play, 'kay?"

Natille's hard eye worsened. "Daddy." She said monotonously, her voice flashing the idea that she was having one of her, Daddy, you're so silly moments that really weren't that emotional.

"Yes, Munchkin?"

"Dey already set up."

"Then I'll be in soon. Take your brother with you." Jay set Onyx on the floor, and Natille, her face impassive, stretched out her hand to the little ball of excitement. Onyx looked at her hand, then at her with a cheesy grin under his paci, before reaching out and slapping it with a resolute smack and running into the living room again. Natille's hand fell back to her side limply. Her face remained unchanged. She didn't even cringe, Jay thought amazedly, watching her follow her brother out the room with a stiff back. He was a little worried about how she didn't react to anything. They'd tried to talk to doctors about it before, but they all told the worried parents that it was a phase.

Yeah, a phase that won't go away, Jay thought, getting to his feet. She's like a zombie. That's not normal, is it? Normal or not, Natille was of Jay's love, where he'd never stop loving his little munchkin for as long as eternity lasted. Unsuspecting of the unexpected, something Sensei would conk him on the head with his staff for, he dusted his hands on his jeans and turned back to the mess. Wholly expecting to clean it up without interruption.

"JEEZ!" Jay couldn't stop himself from gasping. His knees were faced with the light green eyes of Noah, his oldest son, who had in his hands a toy car. Innocence crossed his features. Noah had inherited Jay's face shape, his nose, and his eyes, while his hair was dark like Nya's. He had on a pair of jeans and a long-sleeved shirt with socks on. Like the phase that all boys went through, Noah had a cape—it was actually a blue towel—wrapped around his neck. He looked inquisitive of his father's outburst. Noah was the one that liked to build things out of building blocks. Nya already predicted he was going to turn out like Jay. He was pretty normal, as far as kids go; he wasn't zombie-like or an impulsive screamer/aspiring marathon runner. He liked cars, cartoons about talking animals, macaroni, turtles, and wanted a puppy just like the rest of them. *Correction: Natille wanted a pony. With a horn on its forehead. When she'd told Jay that's what she wanted for her birthday, she'd looked so serious that Jay was depressed to disappoint her. He bought her a giant stuffed one. She said that she was okay with it even though it wasn't really real.

Despite having Jay's looks, Noah was a Momma's Boy. In addition to preferring his mother's company than his father's, he liked to fall asleep in Nya's arms, while Onyx liked to fall asleep against Jay's chest. Noah didn't like to drink the chocolate milk that Jay stirred, for some weird OCD reason. He only drank Nya's. Maybe it was some weird connection to breastfeeding or something—there was just a serious preference of parent going on here. So Jay wasn't really able to have the father-son relationship he'd felt he was destined for with Noah, but loved him just as much as the others. He'd always love him, too.

Noah looked up at Jay and held out his truck. "It's broken," claimed the four year old. "Can you fix it?"

Jay reached out and looked at it. I'd really not rather stare at another damn broken car again, Jay sighed in his head, trying to look happy to be looking at the flame-drawn etchings on the side of the plastic truck. He turned it in multiple directions before finding that one of the axels inside of its hollow stomach had popped out of the wheel. Jay redirected the end of the metallic rod, popped it back to place, then settled down the truck back into Noah's hand. That was easier than the other one. If only cars had the ability to get broken axels like that. Life would be so much easier.

Noah thanked him and ran off.

Jay sighed. "Let's just clean this up, play with Natille, and then take a nap," he grumbled. His head was swimming with frustration and exhaustion ready to pull him under. He bent down to retrieve the stack of wasted paper from the ground, adding to the anthology abundant other articles of squiggles in all different hues to hopefully be on his merry way.

Just kidding.

Three raps at the garage door made Jay groan. No. No people. He stood up anyway, tucked the stack under his arm, trying not to get agitated and scare off the person at his door. He felt ugly with all the sweat and ick all over him from being underneath that stupid car for jeez-knows-how-long. What if this was a customer? It might've been after hours, but what if it was that dude coming back for his car early? What if it was someone new, and he looked like a hobo standing in the doorway? He'd scare 'em off. They'd ditch. He'd lose income—'

Oh, just quit it and open the door. Jay twisted the handle in stressed patience and ripped it open.

"Oh." Jay breathed. His relief carried from his body through the air and onto the presence that stood before him, a clean, neat presence in dark jeans, a black leather jacket, a dark undershirt, and black-n-white Converses, jet night hair long and swept to the side on his shoulders. A dark, furry eyebrow shot up under the heavy black bangs from the threshold that separated the two of them. Jay's body relaxed. He could look like an idiot all he wanted; at least it wasn't a customer!

The bushy eyebrow returned back to its normal spot. Silver eyes beamed into Jay's face. "Were you expecting someone else?" asked Cole, pulling his hands out of the pockets of his jeans. Jay shook his head, stepping to the side.

"I was hoping you weren't anyone else," Jay admitted, waving into his dirty kitchen. "Come in."

The vampire set foot into the house. Cole wandered in, taking in the toys all over the once-clean kitchen, the stack of papers in Jay's hands, the dolls that Cole's sneakers almost suffocated, and the sound of somebody throwing a fit in the other room. It was Rie, who was yet again in trouble for most likely trying to fabricate her stories again. Cole smirked at the dishevelry. "Rough day?" He asked, voice deep.

"To put it mildly," Jay said. He nodded to the living room entry. "Just follow the sounds of the screaming Bansh-Rie."

Cole laughed at what Jay had called Rie since her birth and left him alone to pick up her mess, dumping the contents of crayons and paper stacks onto the kitchen table, where a small tub for the crayons was waiting. He then found all of the dolls and the small shoes that Rie had ripped off their feet. He set those aside, too, then put the papers into the blue recycle bin. He heard Onyx cry without misery from the other room.

The kitchen was clean. Ish. Jay moved into the other room, shoulders heavy, to find Cole in the middle of it, Nya curled up on the couch with a quiet Noah tucked into her side and playing with the truck Jay had fixed. On the carpet, Natille had her dolls intricately set up, some sitting, some leaning against the couch as "standing", and some of them chucked into a pile behind her. Natille was brushing the blonde hair of one of them. Onyx was busy chewing on his paci, standing above Natille and watching her brush the doll's hair, giving encouraging screams for her to continue, while Natille ignored him.

"Be nice to Mom," Cole was saying sternly to the bundle in his arms that was blocked by his shoulders from Jay's view. He already knew it was Rie. He moved over to sit on the couch by Nya after giving a Just a minute look to Natille, who was blatantly unaffected by the postponement of their playdate. He leaned over and kissed Nya's warm head. She's kinda hot, he noticed, running a thumb over her burning cheek. Whoa. Her reassuring smile told him she was fine, but Jay had his doubts.

Rie Tanaka looked ashamed to be scolded by Cole. Small, slender, and very, very ninja-like, Rie's uncut black hair ran down her back in a messy braid. Her olive skin was just like Cole's. Her grey eyes were teary under being yelled at and lectured, which Cole fell victim to and stopped the scolding. He had the ability to just hold his five year old with one arm, but used both to squeeze her into a tight hug. "I miss you," Cole told her, burying his face in her hair.

"I miss Daddy too." Rie said sadly.

"But you've got it good here," Cole said, pulling back and smiling, his whole face softening at the sight of Rie. Jay had always known that if there as anything that Cole loved in this whole world, it was Rie, whom he lived and breathed and continued living for. Having three children of his own, Jay knew the feeling. It's hard to imagine life without them. And even then…if he lost any of them…it would break his heart.

"Yea." Rie's cheeks were glossy. Cole wiped away the tears with his thumb and smiled.

"No more crying, baby," he whispered, kissing her face. "Daddy's here." His embrace wrapped her into another large hug. Rie's arms enthusiastically wrapped around his neck, pulling him closer; the time since his last visit had been long, due to lack of time to come see her. It looked like it had been hard on the both of them. Jay smiled at the beautiful reunion. He was so, so glad that Cole had her, even if it hurt how she came to be. Rie completed him. She was his everything.

"Daddy."

Jay heard his own title come from a flattened voice. Both Nya and Cole diverted their eyes from their current subjects to Jay's daughter, who was giving him the death stare mistakenly, her eyes ready to consume him whole. Jay wasn't afraid of her. He raised an eyebrow. "Yes, Munchkin?"

Her lower lip poked out, and her eyes fell half lidded. That was about as close to a pout as Natille ever got. She also looked like she was giving him a You're really dorky look. "You can't deny me anymore, Daddy," she said lifelessly, somehow expanding her already creepy vocabulary. What little kid says deny? "You're gonna have to play dollies with me sooner or later." Her death stare intensified, like she was threatening him. Only, she wasn't. Slowly, her hand reached out, and in her palm she held a male doll that was wearing some kind of prince outfit. "I vote you be Prince Poo-Poo."

Jay's mouth opened and closed soundlessly. He didn't know how to respond to her precise sentences or her poopy prince.

Then, the strangest thing happened.

Natille smirked. Briefly, just barely shooting across her face before it was gone a second later, a haughty smile of capture danced over her lips. It was gone so quickly that Jay thought he hallucinated, but…she'd just sort of smiled. Smiled! She never smiled! Jay's heart leaped. Maybe she was slowly stepping out of her phase?

"Like I said, Daddy," she told him. "You can't deny the Munchkin."

* * *

**BFQ: Noel next? If not, who?**

**Go have an awesome day/night, and please answer the BFQ! Thanks!**


	7. 6: The Restlessness of Premonitions

****_6. Restlessness of Unforgiving Premonitions _

"Wakey wakey, Princess."

Seconds before the hard slap of a pillow was upon him, Noel Smith had the strange feeling that something bad was going to happen that "day"—and not in the sense that he was about to be physically abused, yet again, by his thousand-year-old half-brother, but that something extremely table-turning was to occur. Something in which did not come with a name, described by his premonitions as something that was going to be changing the route of the future before him. This type of intuition was unusual for him. He normally did not have this heady sense of dread pressing down upon his bare, jutted shoulders, twisting up his face that was buried in his folded arms against his king-sized bed. The sheets were wrapped around his waist, tingling his unadorned, curved back with not the prickle of chill that a creature as fiery as he could not feel. Being the King of the Underworld and all, his skin could not feel intense chill. Quite the perk.

Predictively, the slam of one of his bed's pillows came cracking down on the back of his head. It matched the snarky comment that was the growl of his brother. Noel was expecting it to come, but was not readied for the impact, getting surprised by the _whack! _of sound following after the phoenix-feather filled pillow hit his body. He rolled to his side with an antagonized groan. His wide, expensive room was murky behind the dark curtains that were masking the king-sized bed he laid in, complete with the tall bed-eve that doubled as a roof for him to stare at every time he went to sleep. In this cloak of black, it was quite easy to fall asleep when tired enough. He sat up, noticing the part in the curtains that held the dog-nosed face of his snarling older brother, Eloquim, in a rude awakening. The grunge anger of his scowling snout bore his large fangs at Noel. Literally.

"Time to get up," snapped the relative of Noel that actually had gathered no traits from their father, Elathan, and carried them all back from his mother. He was an ugly devil, too. Eloquim, known here as Silas was what was called by Abovegrounders a Shadow Dancer and to Underworlders a _kage-oni, _which was a demon who walked only in the shadows, unable to move through the holy light. Today, _and _every other day of his documented existence, Silas hid his hideous doggish-bird features underneath his long black cloak and tall hood, doing a terrible job of hiding his protruding snout from vision. Perhaps he didn't care if Noel saw it; after all, he'd been living in this castle since he was reborn into the Underworld, brought back to Noel's very kingdom: the Kingdom of Death. Silas didn't think of Noel highly enough to worry about secreting his facial geographies. He treated Noel as any spiteful older brother did: without mercy.

And frankly, it pissed the younger brother off.

Noel sat up, letting the blankets rest over his hips. His dark brown hair fell into his eyes, in need of a good brushing, or maybe a wonderful bath carried out by his maids. That sounded like a good plan for starting his day, since Silas seemed intent on keeping him awake, the silver-covered pillow already poised in midair, clamped between his claws, in case it needed to be used again. He sighed and scrubbed a hand over his face. "What in Elathan's name are you doing in my bedroom?" he demanded, not harshly. Silas's wet black nose twitched.

"You've been sleeping, and I was requested to wake you up so you could carry out your daily duties, my _King." _The jealousy and anger spat out of Silas's reply. It was obvious that the _kage-oni _was upset that he was not the one oversleeping and commanding a whole kingdom by the gesture of his claws, the bat of his wrist. Noel rolled his eyes. Silas had missed out on the day his father mysteriously disappeared, leaving the duties of capturing a kingdom in Noel's lavaic palms without even a goodbye. It was obvious now that Elathan was not coming back. And no one knew exactly where the AWOL King had exactly run off _to. _His father was not the type of pitiful man who scampered off with a woman to hide their relationship, which Eloquim seemed convinced their father had done. He was a ruler. Not a lover. It scarred Noel that his father had skipped out on him without a trace, and when Noel was so young, too—his opportunities to learn gradually to become King were flushed away when Elathan the Great disappeared from existence. It left the whole Underworld to whisper, to fidget, to create lies and tales. Noel was sure that now, Elathan was just a thing of myth, where his legacy lived on in the infamy of suddenly disappearing quicker than he had come. No search party, no other kingdom, no magical extension could pinpoint where Noel's father had gone. He had just…_vanished._

Noel pursed his lips, looking down at his dirty fingernails. Thoughts of his father quickly washed away and regurgitated new questions that usually replaced his woeful pity party. Thoughts like: Was he ready to wake up yet, or better yet, to fight another day away with his intolerable brother? No, but that wasn't the point.

"_Gwah_," he made the noise with his throat. Noel stretched out his very-human arms and flexed the toned muscles of his stomach, waking up the sleeping nerves and systems in his body. Sleep had been such a beautiful thing until this bastard had come along to smack him from his dreams with an exotic pillow. _Damn you, _Noel cheerfully thought, pushing off the covers, forcing Silas to take a few steps back so he could step out of the square his bed held him prisoner in, his movements graceful and predatory. Noel ran a hand over his hair once more. Twisting his hips to crack his back bones, he proceeded through a list of workings that would get his body into the rhythm of wake for the day, noticing Silas's envious eyes hemorrhaging hunger from a short distance away, trying to pretend that he wasn't staring at Noel in resentment. It wasn't that Silas _hated _Noel—he just hated that he had to be commanded around by his younger brother.

"Ya snooze, ya lose," Noel said aloud, his voice deeper than the squeak it had been eleven-million, four-hundred forty seven thousand "hours" of Risings ago. To you humans, that's approximately five to six years. Time is calculated differently when you are in different dimensions, young padawan. Time for a history lesson! Or maybe you could call it mathematics? Arithmetic? Whatever category you'd like to stick this under…In the Underworld, there is a set of two identical suns: one that is settled in the east, and one that is settled in the west; the twins never go down to reveal night time, but rather rise towards the middle of the sky together, surpass each other, and return to either side to dwindle there until they're ready to start moving backwards. It is really just one long, continuous day that never, ever ends—which is why nothing in the Underworld is counted in human "years" or "days." It is just one long string of hours that they count according to the position of the sun in the deep red sky above the Kingdom of Death. They are called "Risings." For every time the suns met, it was considered, if translated into human time catalogues, a "half-hour." When they reached the horizon again, it was called a "total hour." The suns moved _constantly, _never stopping moving, so the "hours" went by quicker than a real human hour did. So…they really aren't even hours. (It's just really confusing. Don't ask Noel to explain it any more than he has to.)

That's why Noel is not truly the age he would seem if he were a human. In human reforms, Noel would be tolerated as a fifteen year old, or something of the sort, even though he didn't look the part. Since Noel's body was supernatural, more intolerant of human economics, and had different processes than mortals' bodies did, he was actually _billions _and billions of hours old—they did not have birthdays—and took on the body of what was almost looking to be in his late twenties, around 27 or 28. According to human statistics, anyway. Human statistics were dumb. He lived in half-n-total hours. Not days, years, millennia, and so forth. The only human translation of time he used, when grouping together "days," was years, sometimes, because he was taught human arithmetic and culture when he was…uh. Before he was "nine." Which brings Noel to say he was never actually a "nine year old" when he was nine. At that point he was probably…oh, say…. Twelve billion Risings? Give or take a couple Risings.

But old or not old, he was destined to live (again, in your language) thousands of more _years, _so he was still, in Underworld terms, an adolescent. He still had the quirks of a young man, the interests of a teenager, and the curiosity of a child. His facial occurrence had nothing to do with what his status on learning was. (His facial indescrepancies were due to the fact that his mother was a human.)

Silas curled a black lip. "_You're _the idiot who was sleeping, idiot."

_Silas might be hundreds of "years" older than me, _Noel thought, twitching as he stretched more, _but I don't think he's grown up yet. I consider myself more mature! _

"Sure. But I am still, in the end, King, and you're not." Noel stuck out his tongue and brushed past the dog-like _kage-oni, _his head held regally high so he could mock his brother with his stature. Noel's bedrest room was particularly large in size, full of things he didn't use or need. Jewel-encrusted chests and expensive diamonds and tall chairs made out of the finest material of a who-what-zit that lived in the mountains. Stupid things that Noel had never touched. His wardrobe was particularly fascinating, like that movie that Eloquim had told Noel about, the one where a whole other world existed out the back of a magical wardrobe. _N-_something. BUT, like everything else, the hand-painted wardrobe with maidens writ over its wood had never been touched. Noel moved his footing around a large, marble sculpture of a gargoyle sitting in mid room to avoid stubbing his toe and suffering a limp the rest of the day. That damned thing freaked him out, but no one was strong enough to lift and move the friggin' thing. It was stuck there, staring at the window, never moving, face twisted into a half-sneer, claw outstretched for murder. Noel swore the thing blinked at him when he walked by.

_Wouldn't be surprised if it did, _he thought, walking to the long curtains over his window, forty times taller than him and ten times wider. His handful of their silky feel was ripped open to let the everglow of the two suns over the horizon of his kingdom wash across his bedroom, his useless items, and turn them all a stunning shade of pale gold. Noel's eyes recirculated, adjusting quickly to the sudden light.

The King's castle was tall, high above anything else in the Kingdom of Death, perched over a small hill that came after a treacherous walk through a deadly white forest, where all things inside were white: the trees, the vegetation, the roots, the leaves, the grass. Everything was bleach. _The Forest of Wandering Woes_, the locals called it. Many got lost inside of its tricky, winding path, and only those familiar with the land were able to make it safely across to make it to the castle, leaving plenty of lost demons to become taken over by insanity or some equivalent by being trapped in a place so never ending. Beyond the forest was where the small village of _Stuhdfdawu. _Minotaurs, centaurs, satyrs, fauns, walking antelope people, and other distorted creatures moved among smelly _kage-oni _and feline monsters. Steepled living settlements scattered the cracked, red, dry land beneath the hooves and paws of Noel's strangely weird people that he was allowed to look out on. Many, many more settlements—many that made more sense—of villages scattered over the Kingdom of Death, as could be seen from the Bell Tower, but Noel couldn't see them from his bedrest room window. He'd have to go higher up in the castle to see more than just the speckled dots in the distance against the tall backdrop of red mountains the suns usually would come to hover over before another Rising began.

Noel shut his curtains abruptly, turning on his heel. Though staring out at the establishments beyond the forest was particularly entertaining when boredom ate your lip, he wanted to take a bath—but that wasn't all he desired to do. His usual morning agenda kicked in its gears, his body reacting through routine. He turned to Eloquim with a raised brow. The _kage-oni _had his head down and was currently snarling things unlikely under his breath. The just-awoken King knew he'd tickled deep underneath that gnarly fur of his and proudly would've flaunted his victory, but knew what precious time he'd be wasting if he did.

"Well," Noel told Eloquim, crossing his arms over his bare chest. Eloquim looked up, but this time, darkness covered his face from Noel but the glow of his deadly green eyes, burning chakra of ember into Noel's face. He ignored the mental stabbings and continued. "Be gone with you, brother. I'll join you after my bath."

Eloquim's glowing eyes blacked out for a second after he blinked. "Don't tell me you're going to summon the Eyes to spy on our brother again," he groaned before he had time to think about it, his voice carrying him away and allowing Noel to know that Eloquim was very much in on the secret. Noel's muscles tensed. _I didn't really want him to know about that, _he thought tersely, his shoulders relaxing under pressure from his forcible mind to cut out any suspicious behavior. Eloquim would pick up on even the slightest bit of body temperature from Noel.

"No," Noel told him calmly. "I stink, and I don't want to rule stinking."

With that, it was not Eloquim who left, but Noel, abandoning _kage-oni _to stare after him in suspicious lilt. He crossed over the hall to the bathing room with that sense of dreadful intuition come upon him again, surpressable still but quite urging, trying to get Noel's attentions somehow. He felt now as though he were missing a glimpse of something critical. Looking around the hallway, Noel knew nothing foreboding of his senses would appear. What was making him feel so uneasy, making his stomach churn, making his heart race? Why was he overcome by this dread?

The bathing room was, as Noel surprisingly came to, already prepared for him by his maids, who suspected wholly that he was awake, properly demanding of his morning's washings. The large, elegant room with the tub in the middle gave plenty of space to the area encrusted with gold for nothing. A large window expanding the length of a wall across from the doorway was covered by the curtains, thankfully. Six maids busied around the room, touching things, grabbing soaps, heating the river water with coals underneath the base of the tub, with their usual superhuman speed. These so-called demonic fey were scary sometimes. Even to Noel. They were created long long ago by his father's ambitious curiosity for the humanities, wondering if it were possible to create his own type of demon with the use of black magic and sorcery that he picked up in a different Kingdom when he was young. They were horribly a macabre sight for their horrific features. They looked to be walking sand dolls. Their eyes were _buttons. _BUTTONS. Black, beady buttons. Their mouths were sewn shut, something that had not been originally a part of their design, until their voices annoyed Elathan so much that he demanded every one of them sew their mouths shut and never release the thread. Noel had always been afraid to break this rule, even after his father was long gone, fearing that the older King might suddenly return for him and find out that Noel disrupted a rule he'd bestowed. The fey's joints were floppy, their movements jagged like a puppeteer was moving them. Their hair was long, coiled, and yarn-like. Rosy cheeks—circles of red—were brighter than usual. Noel HATED these ones. He liked the maids who were actual demons, with black dots of freckles over their cheeks, real eyes, and long black hair, the ones he could seduce into the tub with him and not have to worry about tearing their cloth.

The fey all looked up at him. Or, well, turned their heads to him, their beady, uh, buttons staring him down. Somehow seeing him through black magic. Noel felt uncomfortable knowing that they _could_ see him, could smell him, but could not feel the brush of his skin to theirs when they touched him, their rugged movements clinging them to him. His reluctance to face nightmarish creations of his father's curiosity caused him to move closer with a stiff back. _So creepy. _

The bathtub was full of heated water—though, even if it were unheated, Noel would not be able to feel the chill, for his body was a little more unique than most. Being the son of the King of Hell, a place where warmth at over 300 human degrees was normal on some odd days, he inherited the ability of _morphism. _Morphism was when the body may look one way but was actually a completely different component. For instance, his father's bones were not made out of bones. They were made out of scorched rock.

Noel's offsetting component was that the muscles underneath his "skin"—he did not have actual _skin, _but rather an outer layer coating his inner layer with a hard, rough surface—were made out of lava. He had the ability to command this lava to the surface by will, and whenever he chose to call upon it, the lava would become visible by _scorching off _the top layer of "skin" before it could show itself. His _skin _would crack, turn to brown, rocky pieces, and fall off like paper that had been burned, blackened pieces fluttering in the wind.

Predictably, his older brother Kai Smith had the ability to command fire. The fire came from deep within his heart, within his _core, _and often fought to the surface without hassle, gained from years of practicing to master his element.

Being the sons of Elathan von Hellraiser, the former King, they got the abilities relating to fire. It was rather amazing.

And Eloquim? Oh, the poor bastard got nothing. He was just a lame _kage-oni _that couldn't do anything but glare at people.

Noel's feet were heavy weights dragging over the surface of the polished floor, uneager to meet the dolls, all standing erect from the floor with their cloth hands curled at their crotches, who watched his every move like a hawk. He smiled thinly at them, trying to break the ice that really never could exist in the Underneath. "Hello," he managed, voice choked. _Quit being a baby, _he thought. Normally, he ordered these maids to be in different places of the castle that he was not, just so he wouldn't have to see the face that scarred the children of the universe when they accidentally watched a rated _R _movie, unsupervised. He didn't doubt that Eloquim had told them to come in here and take care of his bath just to make his skin prickle. _I'll get you later, brother, _he thought, and clamped his lips shut.

The fey backed up. Noel moved closer still. _One foot in front of the other, dummy, _he told himself, eyeballing the nearest maid carefully in case she got any closer. She did not. Her stitched mouth remained closed.

The hair on the back of Noel's neck tingled. "_Is it ready_?" he asked in Simple Demon, clearing his throat.

In response, one of the maids reached out and tapped the edge of the tub encouragingly. Noel didn't smile at her. That would've been too welcoming. "Leave me be," he commanded, wishing he was comfortable with telling them thank you, at least for the trouble. He couldn't tell if the maids were disappointed by his dismissal or not from their impassive, similar looks of empty black eyes and sewn lips. Their yarn hair bobbed when simultaneous nods came from each of the six creations, who all stepped away. He was _not _getting in this tub until they were gone.

As the maids made for the door, his mind clicked quicker than he could process on his own account, and found himself reaching out a hand to the nearest one, pulling her back. She turned to him. _Oh, my Elathan, I just touched one. Oh, no. They have some sort of cootie-lice ridden in their hair; they have worms in the sand inside of their sewn bodies; I just touched one. _Noel immediately ripped his hand away, voice speaking before he knew what he was going to say: "_Jyeid muuv ka-tikami noizkvu Naomi fhlorhna." _His command went unnoticed over her face. Speaking the language of the demons, Noel's Simple Demon dialect faded away, leaving him with the Harsh that he didn't quite think these maids knew. "Harsh" was the much more complex version of demon language that was usually not used commonly by any creature anymore, save for entrepreneurs who had to know the language in order to be able to sell their items to a wide variety of creatures for stable profit. Noel had been learning Harsh since he was…pfffttt….. not even one Rising old. It was, after all, his first language. Second was Simple Demon…third was Taguru, which was the words of the Craglings, and fourth was Ninjean. He had also learned how to speak Japanese, French, and Spanish. He really wanted to learn how to talk to lizards. And not the lizards like his half-brother type of lizards, either.

The maid surprisingly nodded and left the room after the others. _I'll be shocked if she comes back, _Noel thought, wondering if she really understood or if she was pretending she did, and turned back to the large tub that could easily fit two Craglings and maybe a couple _kage-oni. _It was already steaming with warmth that Noel was eager to meet, unwrapping the obi around his pants and pulling them off before tossing them into a box by a round pillar. He quickly slipped into the heated water, exerting a sigh at the delicious warmth, and sunk quickly into its depths. He pulled himself underneath the surface.

Suspended in the water, it was like time froze, where sound came but nothing of a muffle, a tumble of noises bubbling around him. Everything was kept still, the quiet of the deep, shifting around his body to pull him tighter into its warmth so that he may be tempted by it to remain underneath forever, where nothing bad ever happened and nothing good ever remained. Except that your skin got pruny after so long, and pruny skin was _horribly _unattractive.

Noel didn't know how long he lingered underneath the water before pushing himself back up to the top, his head breaking the surface where real noise, real time was, a place that he dreaded and needed all at once. He did not gasp for breath upon meeting the air again. Bodily ready for the difference in no air, there was no demand to look for his breath again when initially he wouldn't have minded losing it. Only the top of his shoulders rippled the surface when his keen senses picked up on the second presence within the room.

For a second, the anxiety once more flitted over him, his premonition screaming at him that something horrible was going to happen sometime soon. He tried not to let it best him. A king with weak knees at the fright of intuition was a king not to be held to the throne. Noel calmly kept his demeanor while looking around the empty room for what presence alerted him showily of its attendance to his little bath party. He saw nothing at first, until a second sweep of the area showed him he definitely was not alone.

Swallowing a start, Noel calmly sat up more into the tub, letting the water slide down his bare chest and drip down his face. He laid his arms over the slick outer brim, keeping the water controlled, and faced the dark hood and the shadowy, dark purple cloak of the summoned.

No face was shown under the hood, as usual, but Noel knew better than to think nothing was underneath. A body covered by the silken violet cloak showed him only just a figure. He watched their unmoving stature.

"Hello," he finally said, in Ninjean.

"_Shumu-kuju." You summoned me again. _Okay…stubborn enough not to want to speak simple, but instead just talk Harsh. Got it. Noel's response rolled off his tongue in fluency.

_"Vtoriakl mi nakfu ja hiaqol fujuklmn harkmnv shu va lu." I summon you every time I wake. Have you not become used to this by now?_

The figure rustled. _"Zidraveiakumani mi qlovxni ju mi namuqt jei. Tu makruvz echt li tora matsu hivakune." Yes, I have sensed this new infatuation of yours. Do you not suspect it is time to give up your interest?_

_"Ti na suu kdywliunifu jau dywa mi nixlaif tunwuva kun. Uqwu ma ni-kuru. Jeuwi dntu ma ki ni?" I intend to keep an eye on my brother, and on his friends. They are numbskulls. That a problem?_

_"Zeiridvka nu laworn mi tsuki tauiro shi no akablunaku. Ztuo mi ha idueqodx ndual… Zeika Matsuhydei. Dueun syormlx nuapji lajurwalniu ndsayag." Ah, yes, you keep close watch, as a brother should. But what of your interest in the woman Seiko Mitsuhide? She is not a friend, to my understanding._

Noel leaned back, tilting his chin. For these five years it's taken his brother to grow up, have children, get married, move on, and not in that order, there has not been a day that went by without Noel's watchful eye following him, keeping him out of trouble. When Kai gets upset, his brother is one hell of a mess, especially a hot mess that shatters things on purpose. Without Noel watching him he'd probably be in jail. He offered as much supernatural assistance he could, like a little bit of black magic that would creep into Aboveground and perhaps avert Kai's mind from the fight he was about to get into or change his course somehow. It kept Kai clean. Maybe not sober, but clean, up until he straightened himself out.

Noel watched Kai through what the Undercreatures called the Kingdom's Eyes. Or just the Eyes. The Kingdom's Eyes was actually just one being, a riddled creature moved by black magic who had the ability to serve those in need of looking at someone who was not present. Like if your husband was out late, you could call the Eyes—at a high price!—to show you what he was doing, if he really was working or if he was playing games with his mistress. The Eyes would show you just what was going on through the use of a magical mist that only the Kingdom's Eyes could create alone, one that could connect with the image of whatever it was that you sought, particularly your husband for the overused example. It wandered around in a dark purple cloak, never showing anyone it's real face, but using its pale grey eyes to project the image of what it saw into the mist. Like a magical movie player. It recycled what it saw into the mist, and the mist captured the pictures and colors using its warping pigments.

Noel had made it his business to, as well as glimpsing the life of his brother every time he woke up, peek at the other ninja every once in a while. Not usually too often. He looked at Cole and Jay very rarely, but watched Zane every once in a while. His life was interesting. And then that _lovely _green ninja, Lloyd flipping Garmadon, was hardly _ever _looked at willingly, even less so than Cole and Jay. The only time that Noel _ever _looked at Lloyd, and with great harrowing disgust, mind you, was when Noel was watching Seiko. His roommate.

She'd left quite the impression on the baffled King. He'd met her first with her loud, overexcited personality, her raging tantrums, her quick sarcasm, her negativity that could wipe out an entire village when she had been captured by him with that—need he say it?—stupid green ninja. He'd been intrigued by the large disposition that was crammed into this body that hardly seemed to be able to hold a pot of gold. At the time he'd met her, Seiko's eyes were blind, and for that reason it had been because Noel got a little interested and happened to steal the sense—supernaturally, with black magic—so that he could use her eyes to see into her past. He was fascinated with who this strange girl was, who the girl with an opinion happened to be. In the Underworld, females rarely expressed their views, so meeting a woman with a voice was outrageous, unexpected, foreign. Noel automatically liked her for her suspicion, her dignity, her eagerness to beat the shit out of Lloyd. (Noel _despised _him, simply because he was annoying. He got in the way of everything.) He'd borrowed her eyesight for a short time to watch her tragic past so that he may gain insight as to who this fiery ball of thunder was. Of course, he'd given it back by feeding her a poisoned Dapplejuno that wasn't really particularly _poisoned _in the sense that poison is a threatening murder excuse that could obliterate your survival with just a taste of it. It was a _tainted _Dapplejuno that had a _shuvkaminu _on it—or, if you're illiterate to what that is, a "Stunning Death" coating on it, a frosting with the purpose to incapacitate a being for a while so it may transform the body to a residual state, allowing the body to hit the _reset _button and switch back to normal. THEREFORE giving back the eyesight that Noel had borrowed. He'd only really needed the eyesight because the eyes are spiritually connected to experience, having seen what it learned, and consequently the only way for Noel to access her past was to steal her sight. Her body features had changed because…Pffff…..because her body was having some kind of reaction to the poison or something. Not agreeing with it. (Whatever it was, Noel swore Kaos had something to do with it, considering now she looked nothing like that. Maybe it's cuz he'd dropped the visual lie.)

So, knowing pretty much everything about her, Noel kept his eye on her through the time she "died" until this very moment, watched her interact with her daily life, finding himself falling victim slowly every day to how similar she was to him. The two were practically identical in worldly views, sarcasm levels, and interests. She was not afraid to say what she thought, didn't care what others believed, and stuck to her word. Women in his world didn't come like that. He'd never _seen _anything like her before. He was besotted with the idea of making sure she was safe every morning when she woke up and approximately every evening after her job ended. For a time, he didn't know why he was so drawn to making sure she was safe; he felt like his world would be broken apart if something happened to her, with him, able to protect her with distant power, watching her behind the scenes all the time. It would be like a producer sitting back and letting the actor make mistakes without helping him fix them, so one day when the moving picture aired, the actor was made fun of for being so shitty.

Needless to say, Noel fell in love with her.

Next to Kai, she was the only one he wanted to watch anymore. He felt creepy for watching her all the time, but at the same moment, he knew that even _if _he actually went to Aboveground, knocked on her door, and saw her face to face for the next time, she'd kick him in the crotch and beat him until she thought he had bruises. Seiko held against him her "death." She didn't _really _know why Noel had killed her. (He was just giving her back her eyes!) But if he tried to explain that to her, she'd never take it correctly, presumptually mistaking it, and resume pummeling him with her small, violent fists.

If she knew he wanted to be near her, she'd go ballistic.

But he would. He'd have no mercy in killing just to be near her. He'd love to wake up every morning beside her in the large bed that he watched her rise from every morning, love to help her carry out her daily life, and even tolerate her son just so he could be with her. _That's _how hard he'd fallen. So hard he was willing to tolerate a CHILD.

"Ah, cut the bull," Noel said in Ninjean, switching dialect. The purple cloak rustled again. "Just show her to me now, and I'll pay you a tad more than you ask for. _Please." _

"I hate please," growled the Kingdom's Eye in Ninjean as well, sounding resentful. But from a crack in the sides of the cloak, the dark purple mist began to flow into the air, hovering in a cluster that would soon stretch with the omniscient monster's powerful sightseers, connecting its mind with the image of Seiko it was about to show Noel. In anticipation of seeing her snarling, attractive face again, his heartal-organ did a circus trick. He was excited to see her again.

The mist hovered in a small storm cloud in front of his bathing tub, like a full screen for him to watch personally for the life of his lovely demoness. He watched as dark shapes began to morph and slowly fade in from the blackened, angry cloud in front of him, colors and pictures slowly becoming visible. Coming into view was the scene of her bland bedroom. The large bed was messy, unruly, and home to a small, curvy shape underneath a light sheet. Noel's breath checked for a slight second. _There she was. _

Her waist-long black hair fell down on her pillow, her back to the view that the KE was watching from, but Noel could see her bare back, creamy, pale, and unblemished, arching backwards in slumber. Her shoulder, one visible in the dark room, rose and fell with intended breaths of a calm human. The sheets were halfway down her waist, tucked up against her chest, no doubt. The clock across the nightstand, just barely in the vision of the KE, said it was seven in the morning. She would be waking up soon.

Seiko made a soft noise. Noel watched her move a little, the motions of someone who was just coming out of their sleep, who was trying to stretch out her raveled muscles that were used to being stationary. He saw an arm rise into the air, then suddenly saw her roll onto her back, catching him off guard with her quick movement. He bit his lip. _There she was. _Her face…

Seiko looked a lot different from the young girl she'd been when she first met Noel, a small child who still had a round face and a childish substitution. Now, she looked like a young woman, her eyes a little bigger and wider, her face _definitely _thinner, her nose longer, her mouth more plump. She had grown, too, height-wise, by however many human intervals it was measured at, leaving behind her body fat and revealing her a toned, young woman who did her work thoroughly. Not to mention her hair that was the envy of all human women.

What was she, twenty-something now? Noel didn't know. He narrowed his eyes speculatively as she puffed out her cheeks with air that escaped through a small casing between her lips, tucked her hair behind her ears, checked the clock and sighed. Her eyes looked a little red. _Crying, maybe? _He thought, hearing her sniffle before staring at the ceiling in tune to waking up.

It made him suddenly angry, wishing he could destroy whatever was making her cry. Was it that Lloyd had tried to make a move on her? Someone say something rude to her? Physically hurt her? That jerk who'd stayed over late, the one night stander? _Menstrual cramps?! _

He'd like to terminate _anything_ that was the cause. Happily so if it was Lloyd. He was thinking of all the ways he could pop in and rip the _bleep_er's head off when Seiko sat up slowly in his attention, keeping the sheets pressed to her chest by one hand, running the other over the top of her long, mussed black hair. Her mouth went thin. It only ever did that when she was thinking about something hard. _Already? So early in the morning? _Noel drifted his body lower into the steamy, bubbling water. The Kingdom's Eye said nothing from the corner of the room.

Seiko reached over to something on the nightstand, her body laying over the bed so she could reach it, and this time she didn't really express interest in sitting back up when she laid on her bare stomach with her cell phone in her hand, still facing the nightstand she'd made a move for. Her thumb scrolled across the screen, and she looked bored.

_Slow morning, _Noel thought, sighing. He was surprised that he'd even matched up his waking hours with hers at all. That rarely happened.

At least she was safe. Seiko returned her phone to the nightstand. But her hand didn't leave the smooth surface of its envelope immediately, the sound of rattling being heard when he saw her hands clasp around something and bring it away from the desk. Noel frowned at the orange bottle of pills that she brought closer to her face, staring at the label before popping off the top professionally. _Pills. _Noel didn't usually see her waking routine. He didn't _know _what she did. But the sense of dread came back when he abruptly figured those small pills weren't prescribed to her. She sat up, this time not bothering to cover herself up—luckily, she wasn't totally naked—choosing to dump a couple of the bottle's contents onto her palm. She tipped back her head along with the fall of the pills down her throat from the gateway of her mouth. Swallowing them without liquidic aid, she stuck the cap back onto the orange bottle, slammed it down on top of her nightstand, and kicked off her covers.

_What are you doing? _Noel growled. His temper flared with the fear that she was an addict to those unearthly human substances that they became attached to. He was hoping that they weren't drugs that she wasn't prescribed with. Let them be some sort of depression relief or cramp reliever. Just don't let them be drugs…

Noel would feel responsible if they were.

Seiko made it to the dark dresser across the room, pulled open the drawer, and dug through it until she found a tank top to cover her almost-exposed upper half. The gray T-shirt was snug against her waist. She wandered around the room, moving things for a little while, before grabbing a something off her dresser and using it to tie her hair up. Then, she prodded around for a pair of pants before settling on jeans that she slipped into.

She found a sweatshirt and stuck it on. Her face, the whole time, was devoid of emotion, the same face that the button-eyed fey made at him, only less creepy and genre to horror films. She found a pair of slippers by her bedroom door and shoved them on.

Her bedroom door swung open, and she disappeared, a second later the mist following her actions and floating back into the cloak of the Kingdom's Eyes.

Noel closed his eyes. _What did I learn today? _He thought, seething inside, a pot ready to broil over. He had learned, mostly, that there was a huge chance she wasn't as safe as he'd thought. What if she was harming herself with those pills, what if they were dangerous, product of an addiction? What if she was making BAD CHOICES like Kai was when Noel wasn't looking? He was ready to march up there and find out for himself, his protective behavior so dominant "today" he almost didn't recognize himself. He wanted to jump into that mist and steal her away from whatever she was doing—but that really wasn't possible.

Ignoring the Kingdom's Eyes, Noel pulled himself back underneath the water again, submerged in heated warmth that kept him suspended in nothing, trying to clear his thoughts.

It had to have something to do with his premonition. Since he'd been feeling this, he hadn't been feeling right. He was afraid that this premonition was related to her, and something terrible would happen to _her. _The only way to know that was if he went up there and found out for himself. Was he even allowed to walk out on his kingdom? He'd done it once, when he went to go help the ninja and got stabbed/murdered, seemingly not effective against his kingdom, but… Noel had the feeling that if he went up there to see her, he wouldn't be strong enough to leave her and come back.

* * *

**BFQ: Who would you like to read about next? Just curious...gimme inspiration for the next chappie...**

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	8. 7: Stateless Minds

_7. Stateless Minds _

Yuki Akamatsu stepped foot into the dangerous, outside world that he'd been avoiding having to face all summer long.

It wasn't that Yuki was experiencing a serious case of melancholic antisocial disorder or a fascinating interpretation of choleric insomnia of interaction that deepened his unwillingness to be around others. It wasn't that he didn't prefer to be around the droids that Master Julien had created to be his mechanic relatives for the rest of his functioning days, until his equipment expired—much like Zane's old body—and ultimately failed one day, leaving him to become nothing but a broken apparatus that had no chance of being saved. That was the worst fear of some of the robots, though half of them would never say that out loud: the fear of cessation. Some of them welcomed the idea to becoming precipitously nothing of the world, while others were scared to leave it behind. What kind of life was there after death when you were made out of metallic parts? Did people like Yuki go to heaven?

He wondered.

Although his curiosity was often shot down by all the other droids, who seemed frightened of the idea of a life after they were gone forever, his programming never ceased to find striking points about the afterlife, nor a way that he could just simply _not be _one day. Yuki did not know anything of what happened when his human body died. What if his human soul was in heaven now, looking down on the robot replica with spite for the imposter?

Yuki feared that a lot. But his worst fear, like many other people, was dying. Funny how he'd experienced it with no recollection of just how dying felt, other than the thought of platonic release from the widdles and crows of earth's heavy grasp. He knew he had not accepted Death when he had come for Yuki, but at the same time, his memory didn't work when he thought of how dying really felt.

Moving through the hall at a slow pace, his long robe dancing over his ankles, the healer adjusted the cuff of his fingerless gray glove with no real interest in where it lie over his false skin. He passed many arches of doorways without pausing to look in. There was no certainty on whether or not Yuki was foraging for company, but rather moving outside of the hardly-used infirmary for the first time all summer.

His interest had been more to the idea of lacing beads onto a long rope. A collection of tied-off strings that all held home to random beads Yuki had sitting in five large tubs kept his attention, day and night, as he individually laced each bead onto it. Sometimes, Zane would come in to visit, mostly because he needed a Band-Aid or something minim like that. Rikku liked to come and sit across from Yuki in his corner table and watch him, the exchange of primary comments kept basal. He supposed that it was because Rikku was mature, and Zane was not quite mature, and Rikku somehow thought of Yuki as mature and kept connections to him. Yuki would never quite understand why people chose to befriend him, but lo and behold the ritual did occur.

Yuki's travelling body was more fervent than he expected to be out and about. He moved along the web of hallways with no real aim as to where his ending location would be, lest someplace deep inside the towering castle of the monastery. He continued to fidget with the cuff of his glove. Minutes of time without seeing anybody went by, leaving Yuki not to think of things while his mind rested unoccupied; unless prompted, he hardly ever thought about subjects he was interested in. Humans had the issue with turning their minds _off, _unable to stop their thoughts from churning and keeping them awake at night. Yuki's problem was the opposite: he couldn't turn his thoughts _on. _The habit of lacing beads became residual without probable cause for thinking about normal things. With all the time the healer spent in that room lacing beads for three whole months, Yuki had not once been able to think of anything willingly—unless he was impelled by another. His mind had been blank. Empty. Stateless.

Reaching the back port of what the droids liked to call "the Dungeon," a cutoff place in the way back of the monastery that led into the basement, Yuki stopped at the inception of the long staircase of darkness. Plummeting down there would be quite some adventure. He'd never actually _been _into the Dungeon before, but he knew down there, holding cells for prisoners were located, and some technology-based equipment was run. He stared at the murky darkness before him. Then decided that he wasn't in the mood for an adventure, and turned on his heel without thought onto another direct path.

"Yuki?"

Time had gone by when he heard his name being said. The droid turned, now with a prompt being able to think about who was asking for his attention. Yuki was not surprised to see Zane standing behind him, a blue Popsicle inches from his lips, looking doubtful that he really had laid eyes upon the isolated infirmary-dweller. Perhaps he believed he was daydreaming the sight of him. His lips were tinted a light blue with the part of confusion separating them, his brows furrowed, head tilted slightly sideways like looking at Yuki with an angle would make it more believable. He gave a clear of his throat.

"Yes." Yuki's eye sensors focused on Zane's face, zooming in quickly to detect signs of danger or criminal intent before zooming back out again. His inner system predicted that in the following seconds Zane would return the Popsicle to his lips and continue to stare for a moment before he said,

"What are you, uh, doing out here?"

Just like Yuki predicted, Zane asked. He found his response clipped. Very much unlike himself. "I was bored."

Zane smiled, stepping closer in the scantily-furnished connector room, connection to two different corridors by a waiting area. He wore a white sweatshirt over white pants, clinging to the last warmth he'd have for all of autumn. "I am glad to see you have ventured from your hidey hole."

Yuki zoomed in on his face again. "Okay."

"What're you doing?" As Yuki began to walk again, Zane took up pace beside him, genuinely keen in what the Yuki was exactly _doing. _Their different walking paces didn't match the rhythm of their legs together.

"Walking."

"Ah." Zane suckled his Popsicle. "Are you having fun?"

"I am not amused."

"What?" Zane looked up at him, light blonde hair dashing over his eyes, giving him a childishly startled look. Yuki's response was unexpected. With this prompt for thought, his mind began whirring to life again, using its knowledge.

"The definition of fun is 'amusement or play.' I am not amused."

"Oh." Why is it that Zane sounded relieved? He brought the half-consumed, drippy blue Popsicle, a shirt stain waiting to happen, back to his lips. Silence fell between them, and Yuki's means for thought shut down.

Something in Yuki's sensors ticked. Not visually, but a pre-warning, a slight notice of something that was to happen in the future. It jolted his circuits with a little bit of the uncomfortability that often made humans squirm. "I sense something brutal is about to happen," Yuki said aloud. Zane's head turned towards him, eyes wide with uncertainty and confusion. He could not stop himself from carrying on through the destiny of his words, rolling out his mouth without his assent to their discharge. "Something brutal that will change everything."

* * *

**:3**

**Go have an awesome day/night!**


	9. 8: Pandemonium's Bastion Awakens

_8. Pandemonium's Bastion Awakens_

Intertwined with the human dimension lies a place where only few men go, all of which hardly ever return. Entering is not the easiest task, but exiting is even harder, for which you are graveled by obstacles named by death that you may only ever see once, the second before you die. This place is where all darkness goes to despair, where all evil resigns itself after failure. It is a place where Destruction has visited by the hands of Goodness, Goodness that threatened to obliterate Destruction by turning it against evil. Using its own element against it, if you will. And for a time, it seemed to work.

This dimension, so entangled with the human one, lies between the dimensions of Hell and of Humanity, a place slit through space by accident and taken under wing to create a large empire in-the-making. Darkness rids every turn and corner of the place sandwiched between Hell and its polar opposite, a creation by Nature that which opposes them so. This is the exile of all evil things that wish to stay out of Hell but remain with ties to Humanity, wishing to one day they may override the indomitable realm. In this dimension, there is nothing but remains of a castle once larger than anything imaginable, destroyed by Goodness in its works. The residue of annihilation stay as constant reminders of stained glass and white-painted sheetrock that lie in clumps, heaps across the realm. They serve as small homes for evil's smallest inventions to crawl into, to live in. For few years, this place has been nothing but for small rodent manifestations of Darkness to hide in, a place for Shadow Dancers and _kage-oni _to wander into alongside many others to take shelter. It has been nothing but obliterated ruins of a once-thriving castle that was determined to succeed in world-overtake.

But there is something stirring within this dimension between dimensions. It is a place teeming with Darkness that is ready to take its revenge, ready to take back virtue with pride in evil that should rightfully destruct the human realm. Things are escaping back out into the human world where they do not belong, attacking what has kept them at bay for so long. Things that the human world could never fathom in any place but their minds. Things that should not exist in _any_thing…but nightmares.

Deep into the realm between realms, an ash leftover from explosion still falls. Here, rules of physics do not nearly apply by letting this ash still hover, rise from the ground, and endlessly fall from the nonexistent sky above, which is a place of darkness that looms overhead. The walls of a white castle so mighty are now nothing but heaps depressed from what they once were. This castle was destroyed by an act of Goodness; now watch as Darkness rises from nothing and takes back what rightfully belongs to it.

The rubble has lain here for many Hell and Humanity intervals of time, but here, time is nonexistent, endless. There is nowhere where the clock starts or finishes. It is simply _being _without a label of time to pressure it. Rock, wall, broken glass, everything piles up on top of what is buried underneath. Things scurry in and out of the debris, unaware of what is happening underneath. A supernatural pulsing, a Power stronger than anything ever created by Nature, is surging in the unseen. It is calling to anything willing to wield it, asking for a hand to clasp it, a claw to pin it, something willing to own it. The pulsing has been going on for what passes as decades in Hell but only a few years in Humanity. And this cry for help has not gone unheard.

Slowly from underneath the wreckages at the very bottom of its wrath, something stirs. It is slight movement that has not occurred in many, many time intervals, but it is slowly regaining consciousness. It knows something. It understands. In so long, it hasn't known how to think, being trapped completely underneath a nightmare for so long. Disfigured, it still lives after everything it's been through. Half its face is distraught by scars, most of its body torched by explosion. What would've killed a human is only in need of a few years of repair for the heartless.

The stirring is not much. The twitch of a finger underneath a heavy, broken wall is all it takes. The supernatural pulsing nearby thickens when it realizes that there is something there, ready for taking it. But time...though it does not exist here…is needed. The creature in which stirs is not yet ready to come back to life yet; the mutilated body of the man falls unconscious once more under the weight of his castle, once so proudly named Pandemonium Bastion. He falls back into a nightmarish sleep of nothing.

But the item in which began the supernatural pulsing knows. It knows that nearby there is something waiting to grasp it, to take in its Power and brandish it in front of the world, and the throbbing of the Power continues stronger than it ever was before. Though the rousing was minor, it proves that even amongst the Destruction and decay, there is still life.

The Shadow Key grows stronger every second it waits for him.

* * *

_"HE'S ALIVE!"_

The youngest Leader burst through the doors of the Elemental Temple after mounting the many steps leading to its glory. Madison did not expect much from the party of the seven greatest Elemental Warriors ever given to this planet by Mother Nature. Deriving from several time periods, each of the leaders was different in their own way, all with unique powers that allowed them to protect humanity from darkness over time—including their own explosive personalities that kept them arguing like baseball fans stuck in hot bleachers. More on that subject later.

She found them as she knew they'd be: standing about, arguing with one another—particularly Lucien and Zara, the two oldest Elemental Leaders that figured they were the ones who ran the bunch—as if they were all human politicians cutting at each other's throats. Madison usually left the Temple because she hated the arguing, and would rather spend her time with the Elemental descendants down in the different sections, which right now were dominated by Fire, Earth, Lightning, and Ice. There, Madison was more or less entertained by the Elemental Warriors that had once wielded the same element that was present in current time by one of the four world-saving ninja. Aaaannndddd that might not make sense to you yet. Dang it…_I guess I have to explain it to you anyway. And I was hoping to avoid the history lesson for a little while longer._

You see, Mother Nature creates, every passing, seven human beings who turn out to be a little different than most by having supernatural powers that were given to them by Her so that they may keep Darkness at bay. Since the rise of the first humans on earth, Mother Nature has _always _birthed these seven select people who would protect everyone else—the people that couldn't protect themselves—from any demons or hellions that were created by the Underworld, a realm that wanted to overtake the world Mother Nature had created. These people with supernatural powers, such as the powers to command water at will or the power to use fire by just your fingertips, became victim to the moniker of "Elemental Warriors." New Elemental Warriors were born when the last of the group of the previous seven died. Meaning, all of them had to be dead before the new members of the seven could be born. Just like in this time, there were seven warriors in the human dimension that would fight in the Great Battle.

These warriors were scattered over the face of the earth, sometimes never even meeting each other in their lifetimes or truly learning how to harness their powers. Nature's plan backfired whenever those type of people came around, the ones who didn't know how to control their power, who ended up being dissected in labs or murdered by people valuing them as freaks. They would come from anywhere and everywhere. The seven elemental warriors that exist today are very lucky to have all met one another.

Sometimes, these warriors were looked upon as gifts from God, and other times viewed as Satan's worst. Indians native to Ninjago thought they were Creation. They were not Satanic, which was for certain; Mother Nature created them in order to make sure that Satan's creations were kept at bay. And when these people _died…_Well, they came here. To the Elemental Realm.

Madison barged into the temple, throwing open the doors with great enthusiasm, but not the good kind. "He's alive!" she screamed, grabbing the hem of her incredibly overdone robes of what Nature thought was fine elegance. She ran into the room, seeing tall Lucien and Zara facing each other but looking to Madison when she entered, annoyed. _Oh, their bickering can pause a minute, _Madison grumbled in her mind, instead capturing their attention with the frantic waving of her arms. She stopped in front of them—the beady eyed Lucien and tired Zara—with her heart pounding. Her _dead _heart pounding, mind you. "He's alive!"

"_Who, _you fool?" Lucien snapped, frowning. Madison looked back at the gaping door of the temple before answering, as if he was following her or something.

Madison panted heavily, evading the question at hand. "I went to the Temple of Light, just to see if there was any disruption in the world outside, to see if there was any Darkness—and there is!" she squealed in upset. She felt like she was going to cry. "There are great amounts of Darkness lurking in the human dimension. It is more powerful than anything I have _ever _come across in my entire time here. I've never seen things so powerful." She shivered. "I don't know where they came from; they just sprouted up out of nothing! And then when I went to research what could've caused such an outbreak in Darkness, I found—oh, I don't know what to make of it!" She finished in a bare cry.

Lucien rolled his eyes at her childish fears, but Madison was not joking about the Darkness. She could sense it. Zara reached down and placed a comforting hand over her shoulder. "Madison, who did you say is alive?"

Madison shivered. Dainty tears fell over her face. "_Him." _She buried her face in her hands. "Oh, it was horrible! He still lives—and worse yet, the Shadow Key isn't destroyed! It is calling to the Darkness in the human world! It's begging for recognition, and worse yet, the Darkness is noticing!"

"Would you quit with your incessant babbling and just _tell _us who is at hand?" snapped Lucien. He sounded angry as usual.

Madison flailed her arms. "It's not _him _that's doing it, it's the Shadow Key and whatever creature is causing it to react! It is tied somehow to whoever is calling for it, and it's trying to find him as he is trying to find it. And now that they're calling to each other, its causing a huge reaction by the community of Darkness that is also hearing these signals that are giving them Power. Power to become stronger. To _destroy. _I fear the worst!"

"_Who _is calling it?" asked Zara gently.

"Oh, I don't know, but—but he's alive!"

"WHOOOOOOO?" bellowed Lucien. "SPIT IT OUT ALREADY!"

"Kaos!" Madison wailed, wrapping her arms around Zara and beginning to sob. "It's Kaos! He's alive! And I fear that he'll be the one to reach the Shadow Key before its Master does!"


	10. 9: The Darkness Rises

_9. The Darkness Rises_

"There is no room for error. Be wary of your mission, and do not hold back."

He took off.

Heart pounding, ears slamming with his heart, Zane's feet drummed against the cobblestones of the monastery's courtyard, his body swift enough to move quicker than could be seen. Traditional ninjas carried the same ability. From the tops of the wall surrounding the mountaintop hideaway, forms began dropping quickly, leaping over the length of it from the other side, infiltrating the sacred home. Their hands were home to many weapons: guns, knives, switchblades, brass knuckles—anything and everything that an undesirable would carry with them in the pits of their pockets. There were at least twenty of them hoarding themselves over the wall, and even that was such a scanty number. All acquired the same target: Zane. And they would _not_ yield.

He ducked the first brass-knuckle-wielding hooded figure, deciding to take to the legs with his own, swiping it down so that the perpetrator's own were knocked clean out from underneath him. The next was already waiting for him with several standing at his back, swinging the baseball bat in his hands towards Zane's skull; he quickly maneuvered his body out of the line of direction before bringing himself up again, taking his own fist and slamming it into the face underneath the hood. Like his training told him to, Zane used a backward attack to knock out the other two who were coming upon him with knives. Kitchen knives, too. Zane was vulnerable out there to serious injury; one misstep, and he'd become sliced cheese on the ground.

But watching him be crowded with hooded figures, Sensei Wu had no worries about him. Out of every student he once had, Zane was the only one he had left, the only student still working to graduate from ninja college and earn him the highest ranking out there. Wu had only begun "rankings" because he knew Zane needed some motivation—although the energetic young man had enough of it as it was—to continue through with his training without the heat of his brothers nearby him. The training course took on a whole different level from what Wu had used so long ago with his Masters of Spinjitzu. Now, the training course for Spinjitzu was hardly ever opened. He used it to train Zane against not skeletons and snakes, but against his own brothers and sisters, the Clockwork Army.

Many of the robots inside of the castle were often gone unseen, staying only in places they knew that they wouldn't exit unless needed. Wu decided to put all of them to work with knowing none of them had any real aim in life, using them as Zane's learning experience instead of people he'd never met before; most of them were light to the idea of helping Zane, once their leader, become a tougher subject. Some, like Yuki had once been, were not so friendly to the idea, but couldn't decline the request from Master Wu. And if they _did _refuse, they had to speak to whom most called "General Rikku" for his high status in the Army, after which the conversation must have scared them into agreeing with Wu's terms.

Thus far in his training, albeit a little sick but not afraid to continue, Zane was what Wu's ninja textbooks called a _chūnin, _which was the second to last high ranking you got. Zane was working harder than ever to become a _jōnin, _the highest ranking. In truth, Wu already believed Zane was a _jōnin, _but he didn't want to say so, for he did not want Zane to lose motivation and drop the entertainment that Wu provided.

He watched Zane fight lithely through the throng, using shurikens to stun the robot warriors and physical attacks to take them down. He worked through the twenty pretty quickly, although due to their programming and the orders given by Rikku, they kept attacking despite their "injuries," which most of them were not affected by. Wu stood upon the steps of the porch and watched this masquerade continue. Zane's dance-like movements were quick and graceful, his leaps bounding and finishing kills classical without mess. At the base of the steps, Rikku stood with his hands on his hips and eyes trained towards the horde of battles happening across his line of vision, expression almost angry, but Wu knew well that it was only Rikku's observant face. He could sense something wasn't right with Rikku—that something was bothering him—but wasn't going to ask just yet, when their focus should be trained on Zane and making sure he didn't get wounded. The point of the weapons was not to actually harm him, only to provide a learning experience.

"On your feet!" yelled Rikku towards one of the robots that had fallen back. The robot crawled back to its feet, as commanded, and returned to the innard of the mob.

Wu smiled when he saw Zane use a white tornado as his next attack to give him space from the crowding fighters, his Spinjitzu still pulsing with the life it had the day he first used it. Many robots were thrown back onto their shoulder blades beyond, skidding over the cobble, stunned. Zane then used this opportunity to run for the handle of the monastery door, which was sort of like the captured flag in this lesson, but the robots knew they were not supposed to let him touch it, for he would then win. They leaped upon him before he could reach it.

The sound of the _shoji _sliding open behind him made Wu turn around, seeing Yuki following outwards with a familiar blue teapot in hand. Yuki's face was uncharacteristically impassive, handing over the cup and teapot to Wu without so much as a comment that normally would've been given by the only emotional robot in Dr. Julien's creations. Light worry skipped over Wu's features. "Everything alright?" he asked Yuki. Over time, Wu had become fond of the robot, often making visits to the infirmary and asking him if he'd like to chat, just because he seemed like an awkward little man who had a hard time fitting in with the others. To sense the deep wrongness in him was almost a stab to the chest.

Yuki's eyes fell on him blankly. Focused. Unfocused. Then: "I am fine."

No, he did not sound fine. His voice was monotonic. It did not change. It sounded like the voicemail bot whenever you went to leave a message for someone as she told you how to leave one. It didn't change, it didn't waver, and it certainly held no emotion. Yuki's voice was _supposed _to move; it was the one voice out of everyone's that sounded like a real person's when it came to speaking. But this time, he sounded like a real robot. It startled Wu out of his sandals.

"That is not correct." Wu was aware that he should be paying attention to Zane, just as he was a minute ago when thinking he should ask Rikku what was bothering him, but this was a matter at hand that he was very, very afraid of. Yuki didn't look like he had the interest to stay long enough for the end of the fight to allow Wu to ask a question; he must pardon his previous mindset for now. "What is the matter, Yuki?"

Yuki's eyes followed routine. Focused. Unfocused. "There is no matter in need of attention." His voice, stoic, empty, blank—it made Wu feel lightly uneasy. He saw Rikku, arms crossed over his chest, take turn to twist his hips slightly so he could look at what exactly was going on behind him.

Wu frowned, stroking his beard. "Yuki—"

"Master Wu," said Rikku. Wu looked beyond towards the icy blue eyes of Zane's brother, his own face impassive, but that was characteristic of Rikku's personality—Yuki, on the other hand, was polar opposites of him, when not ridden by this strange difference. Wu blinked at Rikku to go on. "It is not Yuki's fault. There was a…minor complication."

"With what?" asked Wu.

Rikku turned back to the fight, but continued to speak. His eyes followed Zane. His voice was crisp, hard, and tart. "As you know, Zane has been working on the droids much like Father. His interest has been working on the broken robots we have in storage and returning them back to full function, although that takes quite a while to accomplish. Recently, Akamatsu here experienced a little function issue, and turned to him for help, but Zane accidentally slit and broke the rig attached to his emotion switch, and is unaware of how to fix it. So, Yuki's emotion has been stolen by the dysfunction with the rig, and though we're trying to figure out how to get it back to working states, it's not exactly an easy task."

Wu stared. Yuki's emotion switch was broken? "I sense you're not happy with this."

"Absolutely not," snapped Rikku without looking towards Wu. "It terrorizes me."

"How so?" Wu glanced at the still-present Yuki, whom didn't give way to the knowledge that he was being talked about. His eyes instead observed the fight going on beyond Wu's long hat without recognition of anything.

"Yuki's function is to _feel. _We just robbed him of that because of one little mishap when all he originally came in for was a sore wire. So of course it pisses me off."

"Is that why you are acting so bothered?"

Rikku didn't flinch. "For the most part."

An implication that there was something else wrong. Wu opened his mouth to inquire of what could possibly upset him more than his minor feelings could, when there was a sharp hissing sound coming from the courtyard that stole his attention. Everything in the courtyard stopped; the fight, the movement of knives, all stopped in question of what was happening. Zane frowned and looked up at the sky, apparently where the source of the snake-like hissing was coming from, before trying to find answer in the faces of his opponents, to no avail. Wu felt his body tense uncomfortably. He could sense this was definitely, _definitely _not normal.

Rikku became rigid. As if he weren't icy enough before, a look of anger and hatred zipped across his face long enough to be seen momentarily before he took off like a rocket across the courtyard. Zane saw his brother moving for him the second there was a loud sound of electricity zappingthat shot through the air. Sounding like something had just been exploded by the touch of two bolts together, but no sign of anything of the sort was visible. All of the robots scattered; Wu watched Rikku bowl into his brother, knocking him aside the danger, as the exact same second, there was movement of black shadows skirting across the wall.

It darted quickly. Wu only glimpsed its great movement. It was a small, quick black mass that darted across the courtyard, too quick to be visually marked; the lenses in Wu's eyes struggled to catch it, as there were not many places to hide in the barren courtyard, but the mass seemed to dissipate the second that it came to the other side of the courtyard. It did not stay gone for long. The hissing sound grew louder.

The black mass materialized and shot again across the yard, but this time was aimed for the small dragon statue that Wu had sitting beside the porch. Too quick for his eyes, it knocked over the golden interface and somehow managed to hit the button underneath it before shooting over the area again, this time hidden by the Spinjitzu training course that sprouted up from the ground instantly, pushing over many robots and flinging others into the air. Zane was lifted to the top of the spinning-dummy trap.

The course was not acting correctly. It was all spinning too quickly. The wooden baton poles began spinning so fast they smacked into the robots, the sound of electrical breakage screaming in Wu's ears, their bodies falling motionless on the ground as their panels were destroyed by the too-quick, momentum-propelled poles. Wu had only time to step down from the porch when the mysterious black mass, a shadow that moved across the courtyard and carried the scent of Death in its wake, manifested at the front of the steps and shoved him down.

Wu cried out when something colder than ice, colder than water underneath it in the wintertime, engulfed him, centralizing in his chest where his panel lay. The intense freezing was enormous, horrifying at its scariest, for it was like someone had gripped him with Death and was holding him captive for longer than it need linger. Wu couldn't move. He felt his system begin to react; a shutdown was being initiated. _Cannot sustain temperatures greater than negative thirty; system power down. _The mechanical voice in his head whispered. Wu gasped for air he didn't need, frightened by the overload of his body being attacked by too many icy temperatures. The feeling wrapped around his jaw and throat. Engulfing him. What was this? What was this strange black mass that was attacking his home, overtaking the equipment, and harming everyone in the monastery's courtyard? What…was…_it…._

_System overload. Powering down. _

* * *

Rikku was pinned to the ground by the slam of one of those damned poles in his chest. It had hit him too hard for him to handle, and now he was pretty much stunned out his wits, clapped to the ground because something in his chest was being taken over by being hit too hard. Since when did Rikku ever fall victim to this type of treatment?

He tried to sit up, but his chest was tingling too badly to work, along with what Rikku believed was a broken wrist. Something inside of his panel was broken. He could feel ticking gears trying to work together but not operating correctly, some part of his wires dancing with open electricity, little shots of lightning sparking over him. His eyes could see there were movements of it licking over his shirt, scorching it wherever it touched at the heavy, overpowering glimpse of lightning. Beside him, stowed over the ground, completely damaged robots that had once been part of a helping cause were now destroyed, useless, completely broken without ability to act. None moved.

This wasn't good.

Rikku looked up as Zane was flung off the top of the spinning dummy pedestal, being chucked over the air and across the courtyard at great speed. Rikku hopelessly tried to get up, but the electricity dancing on his broken stomach shot across his body, pinning him back down. _I need to move for Zane! _He thought. His little brother was going to be slammed into the wall or something—and whenever he did, he was going to break something and most likely die, because he wasn't a robot, and he freakin' couldn't be _fixed. _Rikku ground his teeth. By the time he got up, Zane would already be _dead_—_Damn you, Zane—_

A silver form shot across the courtyard towards his falling brother. Rikku caught a flurry of white streaming behind it, but this form didn't look anything like the black mass that was terrorizing this place, some supernatural whatnot that was disrupting the peace. This form looked like a human.

Zane was falling from the air. That moment was captive to the silver form, jumping into the air to catch the one human in this whole place that was valuable. If Zane died, Rikku wouldn't want to live. But this silver form wasn't about to let any of that happen.

Arms wrapped over Zane's falling body, safely pulling him to the ground in the arms of the savior that landed neatly on his feet without mess. Zane was safe and _not _a splattered egg over the ground. He was alive. He was okay. He was saved by—

A bolt of electricity zapped over Rikku's eye, making him cry out in pain, his head slamming back against the cobble. What the hell was going on? What was happening? He couldn't answer, and no longer could see has vicious bouts of the dangerous blue and yellow lighting shot across his face, submerging him by the minor dance it had once had exclusively in his panel, but was now a travelling band. Rikku cried out again as it tore into him, a bolt shooting up his back and exploding in his head—it ate him alive. He screamed in pain.

And then, there was nothing.

* * *

_"RIKKUUUUU!" _Zane screamed bloody murder, jumping out of his savior's arms and across the courtyard towards his brother, whose body convulsed hazardously over the ground, bolts of electricity dancing over his body. He shook, shivered, but even from here, there was no light in his eyes.

Yuki watched Zane run away from him. He still held out his empty arms, as if he was still holding Zane from where he caught him, watching the emptiness for a second before letting them droopily fall back to his sides. Destruction had befallen the courtyard of the peaceful monastery, things ridden by ruin, broken pieces and people lying aloof in no real connection to the world anymore. Yuki had sensed such dangers beginning to happen. He'd sensed something like this was bound to become. But it still wasn't very pretty to see firsthand. The equipment was overridden by some power—a Power that Yuki had felt, a shockwave shooting over the world an instant before the black mass, the unidentified Death, had an apparition in the world. That _thing…_

He saw it out the corner of his eye. It manifested over Wu's body. Immediately, Yuki flashed his attention to Zane, who seemed to be its target, who it seemed to want. The brother was screaming for his own, crying, wailing at the death that could easily be fixed. Somehow. Yuki watched the black mass rise and become larger and larger, a shadow ball that changed shape becoming something out of nothing, sensing that it was going to do something to Zane that would end up hurting him. Possibly _killing _him. He couldn't let that come to be.

The black mass shot towards the grieving ninja.

Yuki, somehow, by some chance, was faster.

He jumped in front of the black thing just seconds before it hit Zane. He didn't know how he got there. Had no CLUE how he'd gotten there so fast. But he was here, and he couldn't feel anything but the desire to protect Zane—Zane, who this monstrous thing wanted, who it targeted. The Zane that caused Yuki grief—but the Zane he couldn't let die.

The mass slammed into him, as whole and real as a real person. He skidded back a few steps, awaiting a malfunction that happened to Wu _and _to Rikku, but could feel nothing destroying him just yet; with his voice still functioning, Yuki yelled, "Zane! GO!" He wrestled with the mass, that was forcing itself against him, like it was trying to shove itself into his chest with no chance of ever getting in there. It was freezing cold. His hands went right through it. But inside it was the coldest black ice he'd ever felt. He'd get frostbite if he were human.

Zane's tear broken face stared at him in shock. "GO!" Yuki yelled, being shoved against the wall by this _thing, _his head cracking against it. "GO CALL ONE OF YOUR FRIENDS OR SOMETHING DAMN IT! DON'T YOU HEAR ME?!" Yuki hadn't ever spoken like that before. It was this demonic mass, this chilly cloud that was turning him angry, spiteful, even though he shouldn't be feeling _any_thing right now. It was making him mad. Making him want revenge against Zane for killing Mitsuko. Killing his happiness by just the stab of her heart that would've been saved by the healer if it wasn't for that stupid, reckless, emotionless robot who thought he was king of everything. That robot that deserved to _die—_

"No," he growled, teeth clenched. "I won't let you take me over. I _won't." _Zane was gone, said his peripheral vision, but this thing was still trying to take Yuki. He grabbed at its cold mist, hoping he could latch onto it, chuck it over the cliff or something, something _useful, _but the monster that could hurt him was only solid when it came to attacking _him. _It appeared only to be solid when it was acting, but when others acted against it, it was nothing but cold air. Yuki bit down hard on his teeth and tried to shove back against it, hoping it would unpin him from underneath its lead grasp, failing to be able to lay hand on the mist. He heard something in his panel squeak under the force. Oh no. It was starting to _bend. _

"No!" Yuki growled again. He felt his muscles tense. His foot slammed against the ground. "_Get_—_off_—_me!" _

And then, the strangest peculiarity that ever became of this earth happened.

A barricade—a _wall _of what looked to be thin tree roots shot up from the cracks between the cobbles, ripping them out their places, separating Yuki and the black mass by peeling them apart. The roots soared towards the sky, peculiarly ripping into the air, and out of their several-numbered natural cavalry, created a wall between he and the mist. Yuki watched them explode from the ground. He'd never seen anything like it before. Almost Jack-and-the-beanstalk-ish, but this was no beanstalk. They were tree roots for sure. They grew tall enough to stretch past Yuki's height, then curl outwards from his body in elegant arcs down towards the mist on the other side. He watched these strangely-appearing elements of nature, shocked out of his mind, create a _cage _over the mist, wrapping around it, more little roots stretching up from underneath the cobbles to help assist in basket-weaving the dirty air in. Yuki didn't have time to be stunned anymore—it was air, and air could leave that cage any second now. His mind went numb as he raced for the house, hearing the hissing noise strengthen in agitation behind him, to find Zane.

He ran into the kitchen that Zane went into. He found him at the phone, as he was told, sobbing into the receiver. "Please pick up, Cole—please! I need you! _Please, brother!_" He sounded terrified. Yuki glanced back at the howling entity, captured by the rescuing roots, that still grew to capture it. How that happened, what it was, he didn't know. But they did not have much time. The overwhelming urge, the compulsion, to get Zane out of this forsaken sacred ground was immeasurably frightening, bundling into Yuki's throat like something to be choked on. He knew then that he needed to leave behind everyone to get the human man out of this place, away from here, before he would worry about anybody else. It would be tough to leave behind _everyone. _But if either of them died, then there wouldn't be anyone left to fix their fallen friends. He grabbed Zane's wrist forcibly. "We have to run," he said urgently.

Zane's face, slick with tears, denied him. He shook his head, turning away with the receiver in his hand. "Cole! CALL ME BACK IMMEDIATELY!"

"He's not going to answer! We need to go! NOW!" Yuki looked back. The wind had picked up outside. The strange anomaly was beginning to command the sky into darkness, and the wind into making things outside creak; whatever the hell it was, it was _not _a happy camper. Yuki grew uncomfortable standing here while these weird roots were the only thing between a ball of black ice and their murder.

"But—but the others—"

"Zane, we don't _have time," _Yuki grabbed his shoulder. Zane looked so scared that it made him feel horrible for being so rough, but if he wanted to live, they needed to run. "We'll come back for them, but we need to get you out of here. It wants _you." _

Yuki had been feeling the infatuation with Zane crawl off this thing since it got here. It wanted him just as he said it would, but for what reason was still quite unsure to the lonely healer who strung beads for fun and the human who had too big a heart. The howls outside from the attacker grew angrier and angrier by the seconds they wasted standing here exchanging glances. Zane's face went whiter than ice. "Why?" he asked, whispering. Yuki shook his head.

"If I knew that, don't you think I would've told you?" Yuki grabbed his sleeve. Thankfully to the rescuer's relief, Zane complied to being tugged away, his feet slamming over the ground after Yuki's. The healer didn't understand where this whole strange mess of an afternoon had come from. He'd think about the catalysts to the battle later, turning to Zane to make sure the poor guy was okay enough to stand on his own two feet, seeing him react to the mysterious roots that were still jumping out of the ground and clamping over the atrocious thing hell-bent on capturing Zane. Something in Yuki's chest told him that he needed to protect him. Keep him safe, keep him from harm, and make sure he made it out alive, even if Yuki didn't. Zane whimpered.

Yuki grabbed the handle of the large monastery gate and yanked with all his might. It responded with a slow groan. Being so close to the problem, Zane looked to be having a near panic attack, his eyes bulging, chest raging, ready to explode over his eyes that were automatically drawn to Rikku's body. Thankfully, Rikku could be fixed when they got back, and wasn't dead forever—neither was Master Wu—but there wouldn't be hope of that if Zane didn't get out of here first. Yuki grabbed him by the shirt and yanked him out the small crack in the door he made. "Run!" he said. The wind was horrible out here, shaking down all the trees, in violence for hitting them all too. Zane ran against the wind that was storming. Yuki glanced, slipping out the door, at the roots. They would not hold it there for much longer.

"Down the steps!" Yuki commanded. Zane was running down them quick, being careful not to trip and make all this useless by dying or breaking something. Yuki followed. The hissing of the monster was even hearable from out here, over the loud gale. It sounded like it was…was _saying _something, now that Yuki listened hard enough…He focused his hearing, making sure that Zane was ahead of him, to the sounds of the hissing. He tuned it over the gusto that was knocking them against the mountain.

_"Sssssseeeeeeee….rrrrrrrrrrrr…ssseeeeeeeeeeeee…rrr rrrrrrrrrrr….Zzzzzzzzzzzzz…aaaaaaaaayyyyyyyyy….nnn nnnnnnnnnnnn…Yyyyyyy…oooooooo…caaaaaaa….nnnnttttt… ..dehh…feeeetttt…..mmeeeeeeeee…I...wiillllllllllll ….wwww….innnnnn…theeeeeeeee….Grrrrrr….aaayyyyttttt ….Baaaa….tttlllllll…Tttttteeellllllllll…..yyyyyorr rrrrrrr….frrrr….eeee…..nnnnddddssss…I….wwwwilllll… ..slllll….aaaaaauuuu….ttttttt…..eerrrrr…..yooooo…. ALLLL."_

Yuki's body tingled with discomfort. One last statement could be made out from the hissing, one that made Yuki happy that Zane couldn't hear:

"_Yyyyooooooooo…..kkkk…eeeeeeeeeeeee...Sssssss….eeee ….vvvv….eennnnnnnnnnnnnnn…"_

Yuki glanced back in shock. The sound of the hissing turned to bloodcurtling screams. Zane froze, looking backward at the monastery, looking too scared to go on, but Yuki shoved his shoulders. He was now just as scared. _It said my name. _"Go. Just run, Zane. Just run!"

They ran.

…

In the garage at the base of the steps, Yuki tore into it, quickly finding Rikku's car without hassle, and jumping into the driver's seat. Zane stood in the doorway without motion of getting in, too, and stared at him. "Where are we going?" he asked, shaking his head. "There are still robots in there. Live ones. I can't leave them." He looked miserable from here. Yuki sighed, nodding at him. He got it. Zane didn't want to leave them behind. "What about Ming? What if the monster takes them?"

Yuki stared at him. His voice came out slit, hard, and irritated. _I sound like Rikku, _he thought of the apathetic brother. "I'm going to get you to one of your friends' houses, okay? I'm coming back here after, but I need to make sure you're okay and safe before I can think about the others. Rikku would do the same. Our purpose has always been to protect you and your friends; let me do my job. Get in the car."

"I can't leave them," Zane whispered, pained.

"Zane, if you don't get in here, I'm going to hit you." Yuki motioned to the passenger side. "_Get in. _I will come back for them."

"What if you're too late?"

"GET. IN. THE. CAR, dammit!" Yuki could sense it coming. It was free. The thing. "It's _coming! _If you DIE, then there's absolutely NO POINT in this, and I'll just get killed too, and then what? Everybody in that monastery dies and no one will be able to fix them! If you stay alive, you can fix them later! OKAY?! NOW GET IN._" _

Zane's lip bobbed, but he complied, getting into the car with more tears being his friends this time. Yuki hit the gas without waiting for Zane to buckle up, sharply turning out of the garage quickly, gunning down the dirt road, hands taut to the wheel. Zane fumbled with his seat belt. "I swear, if the others die…" he whispered to himself, unexpecting for Yuki to hear him.

"Then you can fix them." Yuki flashed eyes at the rearview mirror, seeing terrible things at the monastery, and tried to pick up the speed that Rikku had bought this black car for in the first place. Zane's face was pale white. Quickly turning the wheel, Yuki brought them onto a road that would lead them wherever they were going, desolate and for nothing. "Where?" He asked quickly.

Zane blinked. "I don't know where anyone lives."

"Oh, for crying out loud—"

"—I was _going to say, _go to Ignacia and drop me off there," finished Zane, throwing Yuki an irritated look. "I know that Kai lives there at _Four Weapons. _I think I can figure out where that is."

Yuki pushed harder on the gas. The outside flew by them quicker than Ninjago law said he should've been going. He automatically switched on the GPS in his inner system, hearing the voice in his head ask for destination, after which he gave aloud. Zane looked at him funny for speaking to himself until it was later explained. Rikku's sleek black car was useful enough to carry them quick and far from the monastery's destruction.

Yuki's emotional switch might not of been working properly enough to permit him to feel full-on worry for his comrades, particularly Rikku and Master Wu, but there was the slight ebb of it in the edge of his mind that wanted to arise but was suppressed by a broken function. He felt guilty for leaving them behind. Soon enough, he'd return to them after dropping off Zane where he knew he'd be safe from that _thing, _just so he'd be able to go back for the others. Just soon enough.

Don't ask Yuki how he knew of the paranormal mist's desire to consume Zane in the way it had sucked itself into the body of Master Wu before detaching itself with a frightening slick sound. He had the terrible sense that Zane was in danger minutes before hell broke loose in the courtyard. He'd been having this since the Popsicle encounter earlier that day. He wasn't feeling exactly up to par with the idea of letting his former leader be attacked by an angry glob of see-through black mist that had the consistency of ice on the inside, able to literally force against him with the strength of something real. Equally an anomaly to be confused by was the strange roots of the earth shooting from nowhere at random before _helping _Yuki and Zane escape. What was that? Where had that come from?

The sense that something far deeper than the eye's vision had happened was overwhelming. Yuki repeatedly scanned the event over and over in his mind to grab any details that would help him understand what happened, but to nothing did he get an answer to. He had simply just been cornered by air and saved by roots. As if it were _that _simple…

He took a sharp turn onto a new road when Zane started to whimper again. Yuki didn't glance over at him. _He's probably terrified, _he thought, his "heart" softening in the memory of his healer trainings, when he used to calm down the worried family members of someone who was sick or dying in his mother's infirmary. He'd coax them with kind words, things to take their minds off of their hurt loved one so they wouldn't suffer so much with sadness and fright. This was just like that.

Yuki knew what he had to do.

He kept his eyes on the road, but used his heart to help Zane in a way he knew he could. There was only help offered, reaching out to him with words. "Do you know what _Four Weapons _looks like?" He transitioned.

Zane sniffled, glancing over at him. "I suppose. I mean, I can read. So if there's a sign, I'm sure I'll know where it is…" He pulled his hands into his lap, looking at them sadly. "I can always ask if I can't find it myself."

Yuki nodded. They were almost there…Just a little further… "Have you spoken to Kai lately?"

"Not in five years."

"I'm sure he'll be excited to see you, then."

"Assuming he wants to see me."

"Well if he doesn't…" Yuki swerved down a desolate road, bringing down his speed limit as they neared the road where policemen usually patrolled during the day, quite certain that since Ignacia was only a few decimals away, his speed wouldn't matter anyway. He didn't realize how quiet and thoughtful his voice sounded until later on. "…Then he needs to be stuffed in a corner to think about what he's done."

Zane flashed him a weak smile. Yuki pulled to a stop just atop a large, green hill with a board stating that this was the Ignacia they were looking for. With a population of only 163 people, Ignacia didn't seem to be teeming with anything but farmers and antique shops, from just a slight point of view over the look of the small hill. Around the grassy curvature in the earth, the healer saw people wading through the waters, picking at wheat or something while they stacked it into piles on the shore of a pond that ran carefully around the pure green lands. Ironically placed just a few feet over a small cobble path from the pond was a tall building with dark shingles—and a reinvented sign with the words _Four Weapons _etched onto the wood. Guess Zane wouldn't have to be scavenging for Kai after all.

Yuki looked at him, offering a really small, empathetic smile. "I'll be back as soon as I can," he told the wary Zane. His former leader didn't appear to want to exit the car. "I promise. I have to go back for them now. Trust me…I only did this so you'd be safe." _And I still have no idea WHY it is, exactly, that you have to be totally safe. _

Tears fell over Zane's cheeks. His lip bobbed. "Thank you, Yuki," he whispered, before slipping out of the car into the afternoon's scary light. Yuki immediately shifted into reverse and hit the gas to the floor, jolting backwards over the road and spinning a turn before he could take off back home. _Please, whatever lord listens to robots, _he thought, hands gripping tightly at the wheel, _let the others be safe._

* * *

**_So the bad stuff starts... You all knew it was coming. :( _**

**_Don't worry, like Yuki mentioned on multiple occasions, Rikku and Wu can be fixed. They're not dead, just disabled._**

**_But hmmm...strange things like roots appearing to save Yuki and vengeful balls of black mist trying to kill Zane? Wonder what's going on..._**

**_Go have an awesome day/night_**


	11. 10: Not Everyone Has Maturity

**So I decided to torture you guys with a chapter today that isn't totally about Zane. He's part of it, kind of, but we won't find out what happens to him. :3 I'm just too tired to write that much detail about a very crucial point in the story that I should most likely be awake for. I didn't want to NOT update, so sorry, but bear with me here. A smidgeon of Twinkies, anyone?**

* * *

_10. Not Everyone Has Maturity  
~Yin_

Yeah, I blew it.

It's been three months since my last "trick." I like to consider myself proud that I cut myself out from it for so long—I mean, let's be honest now: do you know of anybody who can quit streetwalking cold turkey, especially when money is needed? I might've only ever done streetwalking 3 times before, so I'm not exactly _addicted _to it or anything, just looking when we need to pay bills, but it's pretty hard to leave it behind when you get paid more than you do at a _real _job. I know I've met plenty of girls who have sworn they're going to cut themselves out of the bad habit that seem to only have excuses for the reason that they keep postponing the day they actually do. The day, as I like to call it, that never comes. Considering the past history of the Artenian girlfriend-for-hire business and the statistics of women who actually quit, it's a pretty amazing thing that _I_ was able to yank myself off the market by just a late-night decision, dropping off the face of the streets without so much as a good-bye letter. It takes guts and strength to move yourself out of a big-paying job when you're trying to support yourself, your bastard son, and a funky Green Ninja who works at a comic book store and has a taste for going out with his friends a lot. Seriously. Working one job doesn't cut the crap, and with my hasty background, I didn't have very many options left. No schooling, a record with the police, and alacritous stalking aren't exactly three key points to put on your resume when you're applying to work at the _Macy's_ department store.

I never really told Twinkies McSnickerdoodles, my friendly roommate who people better knew as Lloyd Garmadon, that I was fired from my waitressing job for flying off the handle at one of the dickhead customers who was being—well, a dick. Let's just say that he was being _incredibly _rude, and, frankly, I don't tolerate that kind of bullshit when I'm trying to do my job and earn a living. But in my defense, the manager _did _overreact when he said I was fired and never allowed to return. I mean, come _on; _the guy had it coming! I only sped up the process in which will one day end up with his ass hauled to jail for being a wife-beater by taking his beverage and throwing it in his face, then smashing the plate of meat over his head. And dammit, I will _not _feel guilty for having good aim.

Thankfully, the dick didn't press charges, although it looked like he really wanted to. Mainly because he just so happened to be someone I had met before, someone who seemed particularly interested in me, but I guess that's not really information I feel like sharing with _you_, a face behind a screen.

Either way. I blew it last night. I've been clean for three flippin' months. But overdue bills seemed to tell me that my personal preferences and my fears were the least bit of my priorities if they weren't paid. Face it: I could've suffered eviction. Life on the streets. Total, utter crap life that I didn't exactly foresee when I was a little girl answering a few questions on a piece of paper in first grade. "What do you wanna be when you grow up?" Hell, I don't even know what I wrote. Don't remember. Don't care to. I just know I didn't have _this _planned out when I answered it.

Of course, I probably wouldn't have had to live on the streets. I'm sure that Zane would be more than happy to accept me and my…_son…_back into the monastery with open arms, a huge smile pressed over his face. Including that creepy hospitality I never got used to.

I still blew it. Took advantage of the fact that Snickerdoodles decided to take my little "bundle o' joy" to his parents' house for the evening, desperate for the money to pay off the bills I knew wouldn't be covered by my coffee shop coinage and a few dollars scrounged up from bought comic books. I'm not really into sticking my hand in an account given to me by my frightening doppelganger who once pretended to hate me, actually loving me underneath the snarls. The news of how much Maya Kiko, the ever-vengeful Original Vampire, cared about me underneath the dirt and grime caking her surface was a blow to the head the night of her death when she sacrificed herself for me at the hands of my worst fear. Snickerdoodles told me everything after I found the note on my bed, practically handing over the keys to her safety deposit box—except she'd already done all the paperwork. Maya had known she was going to die, so she gave me the millions of dollars she'd saved up over her long life. The millions of dollars, she claimed, that she was keeping for me.

I can feel my mistakes hanging in my bones, you know. Not that getting up every morning is easy, but today it's…harder. Like the four hundred dollars sitting in my pocket are actually five hundred tons of steel that are just trying to drown me in them.

_Those aspirin aren't helping, _I thought of the pills I'd consumed when I woke up this morning. The kitchen was cold, but the air was heavy like the heat spreading across the swamps during the summer that was just beginning to transition into cold. My bare feet padded across the checkerboard linoleum tile with prickles of ice leaping into the soles of my skin. The place where I spent a lot of my time at home was not yet awake, barely brimming with the smells of food and of coffee that normally were heady at this time of the day, so early at like 9 in the morning. The lack of luster was probably due to the fact that it was a Sunday, meaning Snickerdoodles didn't have to get up for any spendy college classes or an outing at the comic shop that normally made him rise wincing at this time of day, trying to swallow revitalizing coffee. I wrapped my hands over my bare arms, taking a deep breath of the stale air for comfort. Grabbing a sweater was a good idea, but as it may be, mine were all in the washer. Wet.

I moved into the small living room directly connected off the kitchen, looking for a blanket to wrap around myself, particularly the one that Misako, Snickerdoodle's mom, had knitted for me for Christmas a couple of years ago. I found no sign of anything but a coffee table covered with Bokuyo's senseless creations out of multicolored Legos, until I realized that I'd offered him to use my blanket in his bedroom, since he only had one blanket in there and it got pretty cold in his room at night. I growled with irritation. _Why did you have to pick THAT moment to care about him freezing to death? _I berated myself. I turned away from the pitiful living room, swearing right and left that I could see my own breath, with my tongue bitten.

Making coffee has never been my favorite morning routine. Normally, I hate coffee's bitter taste with my own preference of tea over the teeth-destroying stimulant, but today seemed like a good day to use it. I started up the coffee machine with absolutely _no _idea how to work it other than to plug it in. Snickers usually makes it, so I'm about the last person in Ninjago who would know just how it functions—the buttons don't even make sense. If they had words on them, I'm pretty sure I'd know how to use it, instead of replacing good ol' letters with pictures of squiggly lines and what looked like a blob with a handle. I stared at the strange, alien markings with no real intention of memorizing their purposes. Can't they make technology, I dunno, more un-complex for those of us who don't really have a handy textbook on button-picture lingo?

I tried to figure out if I was supposed to put water in it or something, pressing one of the buttons that _looked _to not be as complicated but turned out to be a dirty rotten liar that only faked itself out. At my excessive button pressing, the machine protested with a loud _beep _that cut through the silence, shaking me a little from my comfort with the quiet. The small screen on the top of the machine prompted me with what looked like another symbol for something. I groaned. This might take longer than I expected.

"Need a hand?"

In the silent kitchen, barely brimming with the sound of a pin dropping, I whirled around to find a disheveled looking Snickerdoodles standing there, wearing a pair of green plaid pajama bottoms with a wrinkled white T-shirt on top, hands crammed in his pockets. His golden hair was mussed from sleep in a way that most men try to achieve with hair gel overload, making him the envy of the morning, I suppose. Lloyd flashed me a crooked _I'm still waking up _smile while moving towards me without really asking for an answer; I'm sure that my confused, albeit agitated, facial expression had enough of his solution on it already. I stepped to the side wordlessly for him to begin working his magic, actually pushing buttons in a combination that the machine could recognize, and I was ruefully drawn to watch the muscles in his arm jump at the touch of his fingers to the commands. Snickerdoodles opened the cabinets above the red coffee maker, pitched into a corner on our tan counters next to our hilarious white fridge, to grab himself two mugs, bringing them out with just one hand. A couple fingers wrapped around their handles to gently settle them onto the worn surface of the counter, Lloyd used his extra hand to quietly shut the wooden cabinet that squeaked when _breathed _on.

The installed essential living accommodations of this apartment are a joke. The doors to every cabinet in the kitchen have fallen off at least _once, _and all of them refuse lubricant treatment to stop them from squealing every time someone touches them. In comparison to the _lovely _tan, sandpapery countertops, they're painted puke-yellow, and the sink sucks when it comes to garbage disposal. No dishwasher, but a mini-microwave sitting pretty on the counter and one of those white refrigerators that have the bumpy surface and wooden handle with the brand name that nobody cares about on it. There thankfully was a stove and oven tacked next to the sink. The kitchen table that this place came with is a dingy circle with four chairs that we had to put cushions on because we were bruising our asses. _Then, _the living room came with FLORAL PRINTED COUCHES. Well, just one couch, and a mismatched black recliner that was good for napping, but had darker flowers printed on it. What are we, old ladies?

I can't complain, though, that it came with a personal washer and dryer, slammed into the back corner of the living room. And two bedrooms, plus a half-bedroom coming off my room that was supposed to be for, like, a big closet area, and one bathroom next to Snickerdoodles's room. A _pathetic _bathroom, mind you. Don't even get me started.

"Sleep good?" Lloyd asked me, punching the silence in the gut. His friendly, groggy morning voice allured me with the way _good _rolled out of his scratchy voice box, like I normally was. My attraction to his voice had always gone unheard; it's not like I'd ever tell him that. I'd sound like a creep.

I found it hard to speak. Not because of listening to him, so don't think I'm being pink taffy in his hands, here. I neglected to mention that I hardly ever speak these days, except for when I'm working at the coffee shop or when I have to tolerate Bokuyo's pointless babble or when I'm sometimes trying to make an effort with Lloyd to keep conversation. That's probably why my stage name has always been "Silent Lamb."

_Yeah, the secret stage name that Twinkies McSnickerdoodles knows nothing about, _I thought, opening my mouth to try and force stuck words out. "Fine," I managed, knowing that to me my voice sounded hollow. I saw Twinkies purse his lips, nodding slowly, while he processed the way that I'd made no progress since he last talked to me about getting back my humanity. The humanity I had stolen from me. The humanity that I no longer could sustain.

The tragedy of what happened to me hadn't ever been spoken about since that year, but somehow it still managed to keep its grip on me, holding me down and tying me to a weight at the pit of the ocean. It stopped me from feeling things anymore. It stopped me from talking for pleasure—I even found it hard to make snarky comments at Twinkies, although a lot of times I forced myself to say them, trying to persuade his concern that I was fine. That I was myself. I wasn't, but trying to get him to stop giving me the pitiful look was more important to me than actually trying to get back my humanity.

I knew he'd discussed it time and time again with Zane. I've heard them talking on the phone before about "how much it seems like I unintentionally turned off my Humanity Switch, even though I didn't do it consciously." I don't know. Maybe I did. I feel things sometimes, but…a lot of times…I don't.

"You're up early," I coughed out. Lloyd looked over at me through misty, tired eyes, and gave me a reassuring, almost retired smile. His toned shoulders moved underneath the material of his T-shirt with strength, shifting around the world while he rummaged through the cupboards for sugar and creamer. My guilty eyes fell away from his body and onto the floor, a little scared of being caught watching him in the way that they always were. Joined to him at the cornea, my eyes always had a tendency to find him whenever he was in the room, regardless if they had my permission to wander there or not. I kept my eyes pasted to the floor with culpability.

"Ha," he said, voice almost laughing. I saw his movements out the corner of my eye. He turned his back to the counter so he could place his weight to it, clasping his hands behind his head with interlocked fingers, smirking into the air. "Yeah, earlier than I wanted to be, but I heard you get up."

"So?" I followed the lines of the rubber patent that kept the tiles glued together, shaping out their outline with my numb eyes.

"_So _I decided I wouldn't make you stay out here by yourself." Lloyd retorted, his voice joking. "Plus, I had a strong feeling that you were going to make coffee, and I know about the war you have with my machine."

"There wouldn't _be _a war if the buttons made sense," I grumbled, tucking a falling strand of hair behind my ear. Lloyd's tired chuckle filled the kitchen for just a brief moment, and I was sickeningly reminded yet again of what little feeling I could entertain, this time the tug of my gut towards him as if by some magnetic field drawing me to him. It was the same force that made my eyes follow him in secret. It was the same force that made my stomach knot and twist painfully every time I heard his voice—but a good type of pain that left me craving for more of it.

I've known him for five years, been his roommate for most of that, and never once in my time being forced to grow up so quickly had I ever gotten the courage to tell him how I felt. After aging three years in few seconds when I was attacked by a spell given to me by a now-deceased witch, my life suddenly was flipped by perspective from the narrow vision of a bitter fifteen year old to the widened range of an eighteen year old mother who had her own child to support. Knowing now what I know about how the world works I feel like an idiot for wanting revenge against it as a kid. I realize how _childish _I was for a fifteen year old. So hostile. So _odious_. I know why I acted how I did, because of what I'd grown up with and all the hurt inside of me, but now that I've faced the real world without knowing what to expect, I can't understand what compelled me to change. I mean, now I have even more reason to hate the world as passionately as I did before. But all of the anger, the will to hate, has somehow been drained out of me like my energy that usually dissipates halfway through the day. My reason for change—well, I like to think it's because I'm older now, and I'm not the same. But I know it wasn't just the aging potion that made me convert. It was my five year old son, Bokuyo, and the fact that I had to face a world I'd never even associated with before, a world where there were jobs and bills and work. Things I'd never even thought about as a younger girl.

My rock, the whole time dealing with this sudden change, has been Lloyd. He's been through the quick-aging process, and he knew exactly what I felt, able to offer me the advice, the _assistance _that I knew my brother couldn't ever have provided. At first, I denied and denied and shoved him away, using violence and insults as my repellent, but that never stopped him from trying to help me. Lloyd had already matured enough to know that fighting back would've gotten him nowhere.

And one day, after pushing him away for the last time, I realized that what I was doing was stupid. Fighting with him, being so angry at everything, insulting him just to insult him, being so negative—it was all just so stupid, and exhausting. I didn't exactly turn into a Cupcake with a happy-go-lucky new attitude or anything, but maturity sunk in, telling me that maybe fighting with him about the help I really needed was stupid. My insults towards him died, only showing every few times when they were meant jokingly. The anger retreated. I stopped acting so childish all the time.

_But _I can tell you the negativity is still there. I still make comments at the things I think are ridiculous (totaling to about half the world's population of _things) _without mercy for who might feel offended by my words. I take no mind to that, although I am more empathetic when it comes to saying things. I've started a trend in myself of thinking before doing. So far, it's done me good.

The whole time, Lloyd supported me every step of the way. He was the ears that listened to my problems, the smile that showed me how to be _somewhat_ happy, the hand that guided me through life beside him. The best friend that I felt, deep in my heart, Maya had once been, although I couldn't remember my time with her. If this were back then, I never would've said it, keeping my lips sealed about the truth of the situation: He _is _my best friend. Probably my only friend, but my best friend all the same. He's there for me. He's _been there _for me.

Like every other pathetic love story, I have feelings for him that are deeper than just our small friendship. Feelings that are clearly not reciprocated by him, for time has pushed his romantic focus _away _from me; I know that five years ago, he had shown that he "liked" me a little bit, by trying to kiss me once. My stubborn denial that I could be loved by anyone pushed him away. My actions told him I wasn't interested. But by the way that…the Devil…Kaos…manipulated my mind using mirages, it's so clear to me now that I had feelings for him back then as well, just trying not to admit it. Time developed more of a connection to him in ways I never knew that I could feel. Feelings that make it hard to breathe. That make me love him even more. But I'm scared of loving him, of admitting that out loud, because I don't know what will happen if I told him that I've gone through the phases from a small crush to a hopeless love in five years. I don't think anymore that I'm the focus of that love because I have shown him I don't want him. I understand completely why he wouldn't want to give back the feelings I have anymore.

You might wonder how I can have feelings for him when he has the same face of the man that once attacked me and stole something precious from me, something I can't ever get back. It might not make sense to you how I can be around Twinkies when technically I'm looking at the same face that has haunted me for five years. And let me explain it as this: though they look the same, they aren't the same person, and their discriminating persons are what makes it so easy to look at Lloyd but so frightening to think of _him…_Kaos. They're too different to be considered the same.

And they really don't look that alike. When comparing the two, _he_ is just a curly blonde with inimical blue eyes, but Lloyd has the golden waves and the dazzling sapphire eyes that gravitate you towards him. Lloyd's smile is friendly, but _his _was menacing, slimy, disgusting through all hell. _His _cheekbones were higher and more prominent than Lloyd's. _His _nose was pointier. I didn't realize the differences until I looked at Lloyd again after being with _him _for so long. Lloyd looks human. _He _looked…inhuman.

Looking at the floor, I felt my chest constrict with the inability to breathe in real air, forced to part my own lips to draw a sharp breath into my cooled mouth. I rose my gaze to Lloyd's eyes. He was watching with pursed lips, eyes still droopy—it was so obvious that the guy needed to go back to bed, and as flattering as it was to know he got up just when he was sorta worried about me, his exhaustion would make _me _want to go back to sleep. I deployed a reassuring smile onto my lips against their will. "You should go back to sleep," I said, voice a little hollow. "You look tired enough to pass out into your coffee mug."

Lloyd's tired smile stretched lazily over his face, a closed-lip extension while his eyes shut for a split second. "I'm fine," he said quietly. "Just gimme a minute."

I wanted to walk over to him and lean my forehead against his shoulder, close my eyes, and just stand there while he rubbed a hand over my back, but I knew it would be weird if I did that. _Only people who are in love can do that, _said that ever-present spiteful voice, prodding around the back of my mind, waiting for any chance it got to steal the show. Instead, I wrapped my arms around myself, cold and shivering.

"It _is _pretty chilly in here," Lloyd said, running a hand over his hair. "I can't believe they don't turn on the heaters in the building until November."

"The landlords are idiots," I growled. "They think we all have the superhuman ability to survive harsh Octobers without needing a little bit of warmth to live. Or that we all have blankets made out of alpaca fur stuffed in our closets."

Lloyd humored me with a tiny smile. "We just need to buy a space heater," he said, crossing his arms over his chest. "They sell 'em at _InOut Mart _for, like, twenty-seven bucks. I think it's a good investment to make." His eyes slid towards the left, the space where our bedroom doors were, flashing with a little bit of concerned worry in his dark pupils. "Stick it in Boku's room at night and leave it in the living room during the day."

I sighed. _I'll buy one soon, _I thought, thinking about the money I'd earned, _just as soon as the bills get paid and the guillotine for eviction isn't hanging over our heads. _For now, we'd have to freeze.

"When's rent due?" Lloyd's tone quickly changed from conversational to low, as if he were worried about the currently empty room overhearing about what he was saying. His light eyebrows furrowed slightly when I told him it was due by Monday—which was tomorrow. "Damn," he sighed, chewing his lip. "I just paid off the electricity yesterday, so I'm out of cash right now."

"You did?" I asked, surprised. In this building, your electricity charge was not connected with your rent. Our heavy bill for the housing was backed by the electricity bill we kept trying to lower by unplugging things that weren't being used, keeping most of the lights off unless we were in the room, but somehow, it always ended up being high anyway. I'd gone to great lengths to argue with our landlords, up until they were tempted to kick us out, until Lloyd had stepped in to cover the ground with another layer so I wasn't stomping on thin ice anymore.

Lloyd nodded, still looking tired. With his hands resting on his elbows, he tilted his head to the side at a slight angle, chewing on his lip idly. His eyes seemed to look right through me with thought. "Yeah," he said. "I had to borrow some cash from Mom and Dad just to help shove it off." He looked a little upset, turning his head away from me to look towards my bedroom door, where somewhere beyond Boku was still at peaceful rest, unaware of what his mother and her roommate were going through. "I guess I can go beg my boss to give me what little of my paycheck I have today, although I don't think it'll be much. You got paid last Friday, right?"

I nodded. He had no idea that I had just illegally earned four hundred dollars, which, added to my paycheck from the coffee shop, meant we could clear rent by just a few pennies. I'd be dirt broke by the time I sent off the money into the hands of our shitty landlord, and we'd be out money until Lloyd got paid this Friday, unless I did something I shouldn't be doing again. Something I didn't _want _to do. Self-consciously, I moved towards the fridge to check out how much food we had; after inspection, I declared it was enough to feed us for the week, until we could go limited grocery shopping on Friday. Plus, we had canned food we could use if we suddenly lost the cooled supply.

How was I going to explain to Lloyd that I was able to pay rent so easily? It was my turn to chew on my lip, nervously trying to think of some excuse. I could say I got it from my dad, but…I hate my dad, and wouldn't ever turn to him in a zillion years for help. He'd be the _last _person I'd turn to.

My brother Cole, maybe? _No, Lloyd would thank Cole for the loan, and then Cole wouldn't know a thing about what he was talking about, and that would backfire. _I don't know what I'd do. I'd think of something…

The stressed look on Lloyd's face, mouth covered by his hand in thought, made me feel sick. _He's trying to think of a way you guys won't have to get in trouble—possibly evicted—for late rent again, and you already have the cash secured. _The voice in my head tingled. _How rude. _I stood up taller, defiant of the little voice, and placed a hand on his arm, making him shift his eyes towards me without moving his thinking position. "I'll handle it," I told him quietly. "Don't worry."

"There's no way your paycheck covers it," he said, letting his hand fall. "_Or _what I can get from mine, assuming I can get it. Don't you think you can…"

"_No." _I knew what he was going to say. I looked him straight in the eye. "I'm not touching that money, Lloyd."

"We're in trouble, Seiko. And plus, it's only a couple hundred bucks." He lifted his body off the counter when the coffee maker beeped for aid, ready to be emptied. He turned around to fiddle with the pot. His strained tone made me feel a little guilty. "It won't put a dent in the account, and plus, the thing's friggin' gaining interest as we speak. Can't you just take the money out? Something to help us move along? We're hitting a road block, here. We're running out of options," he said, shooting me a disproving look in reference of my choice to steer clear of the uncomfortable quantity of money. I lifted and stuck out my chin insolently.

"I told you. _I'll handle it." _

"What are you going to do that's going to fix this?" Lloyd hissed. He looked upset with me—an upset I didn't like to see on his face. "Seiko, we seriously don't have many options. Just take out a couple of thousand. We'll buy the heaters for the apartment, have leftover money to pay for rentand the bills, and also have extra money for groceries and stuff. You have to know when to use the money, and I think this is a pretty good example." He poured coffee into both of the retrieved mugs with a quick dab-dab, then stuffed the pot back underneath the dispenser of the now-unplugged coffee maker, sliding the sugar towards me briskly. "Do you really want to live with all this stress when you _have _the money—you're just scared of using it?"

I kept my chin raised. "I said I'd handle it."

Lloyd growled exasperatedly, scrubbing both hands over his face. I felt disappointed in myself for letting him down, but I refused to touch the money, and also had enough to pay off the bills…We were _fine. _He just didn't know that we were fine. He tended to be more concerned about these things than someone like I was, who drifted through the days without second-guessing the integrity of the situation. He prepared his coffee in silence, not exactly mad, but thwarted by my abstinence against using the money Maya gave me. I watched him without saying anything. I didn't know what to say. "I'm sorry"? I was sorry that I couldn't tell him that I could pay the bill—not without having to tell him how I got it. I sighed.

Lloyd turned around at me, flicking up his eyebrows, letting his lower face fall into a dissatisfied line. He pulled his mug of coffee to his lips, his eyes hitting me with a look of annoyance. My mouth sucked into itself, where my teeth clenched my lips between their dull edges, leaving me quiet as Lloyd gave a humorless, agitated laugh. He shook his head. Suddenly the friendly, groggy morning happiness was gone, giving instead to someone who was angry for having the same unrelenting argument with me for the hundredth time, getting the same ending. "You're right," he finally said, voice flat enough to tell me he really was cross. Lloyd detached himself from the counter. "I _am _up early. Too early, in fact, to be dealing with bullshit." With that, Lloyd took his mug and practically _stomped _all the way back to his room, closing the door without the large _bang _that I normally would've expected to hear after his mood swing. I stared after him, used to that, and looked at my own cup of coffee, trying to ignore the sting in my stomach that I always got when Lloyd left me mad. But then it was sparked with anger of my own. Why can't he just _not _get so upset over money? Really. It doesn't require a tantrum worthy of a silent movie from the vintage days.

I turned on my heel and went into the living room, plopping down on the couch with my lips puckered with disinterest for the inevitable argument I knew would be coming eventually. _Jerk, _I thought, jutting out my lip. I picked up a magazine off the coffee table and stared at the face of the celebrity masked with the plasticized cheeks, making her mouth so stretched out she looked to be able to shove her fist into her mouth. I didn't actually have enough interest in the shocking scandalous cover story that the magazine was advertising, but rather asking my surroundings for something to entertain myself with, flipping through the pages without reading them. I tore a page or two by flipping them a _little too _animatedly. The advertisements with nude women, half naked dudes, and people in the shower seemed like overkill for advertising body wash and perfume/cologne. Really. Do we _need _to see all that stuff when you're advertising freaking _perfume? _If _I _were the director of advertisements, I sure as hell wouldn't waste my time flaunting around the pretty girls with the skinny bodies, long legs, and beautiful long hair. If I wanted to advertise a fucking perfume bottle, I'd do it with a picture of a flower or something that, you know, _had something to do with the smell. _Not nudity. That has NOTHING to do with perfume.

I actually don't know when I got so bored of the magazine that I fell asleep lying against the fat pillow leaning on the arm of the couch. The magazine slipped off my lap, my head rested on the pillow, and my legs tucked themselves up on the ugly patterned furniture beside me. I guess I was more tired than I thought I was.

When I finally woke up, it wasn't because I was done sleeping. It was because I felt a little tiny body crawling across my legs and lying behind them against the seat of the couch, small hands putting themselves on my thighs. Out of the fog, I raised my head to see Bokuyo, my son, situating himself with the comforter from his bed being dragged up onto the couch beside him. I was startled by the look of him, for a second. Unlike the Bokuyo I had met five years ago—the Bokuyo who had traveled from the future to warn Twinkies and his gang about the impending doom awaiting them in their path—the one I had given birth to was nothing similar to the one I had met. I don't know what changed him from a blonde, blue-eyed, enthusiastic little boy. I'd had expectations as the kid grew up, but every second, he surprised me by being completely different than the one who asked me to hold his hand all the time. My Bokuyo's hair was a tousled mane of wavy black locks that we had a hard time getting to lie down; his eyes were a blueish gray that looked like dead skin that was bruising. He had black eyebrows that looked like dead caterpillars on his face; I plucked them every time he took a bath to make sure that they didn't grow out to be anything appalling. They looked like Cole's eyebrows. Probably genetics. I'd always been a little challenged by my eyebrow hairs, too, and plucked them to make them thinner and more attractive than the fat things I'd had before. He had a shade of slightly tan skin, very different from the _other _Bokuyo's, who looked like the undead with his pale complexion. And my baby was short. He barely reached my hips. Not that the other Boku was tall, but I know he was tall_er _than mine.

MY Boku doesn't like being all smiley. I mean, I can tell when he's happy and when he's not, but he isn't smiling constantly like the other Boku always did, in a very Zane-ish way. He likes to keep to himself, especially when we go to the park and there are other kids there, but will play with them if he's encouraged to. Which is usually by Twinkies, because…I don't really like pep talks.

He was a smiley baby. He smiled a lot. But I guess his unwillingness to smile all the time is probably my fault.

So my baby is pretty much the polar opposite of the other one. I don't know what translated and changed his inner code—I don't understand it at all, but who am I gonna ask to explain it?

Bokuyo noticed that I was awake and gave me a tiny, five-year old toothy smile. His hair was messy from sleep, and his wide eyes were still trying to pry open. "Mownin," he said.

"Hi," I replied, helping him drag his blanket onto the couch, thankful for the opportunity to get warm. Once settled, Boku laid his head on my hip, putting his hand on my belly. I looked down on him. "Are you still tired or something?" I asked in a tone I'd use if I were asking an adult. Boku made a noise.

"Ya Momma. I tired."

I stroked his hair. "Join the club."

"Cub?"

_"Club."_

"Cub."

I thought that by now he'd be able to speak proper language. I guess not. I patted Bokuyo's head, grabbing his tired attention, and smiled at him warmly. It didn't last long. "Come up here," I commanded, patting my chest. When he was little, I used to lay down and lay him over my body, where his head rested on my chest and his teensy little body laid over my stomach. He fit there like…like he was specially crafted to match up with the contours of my body or something, like the way a yin fits to a yang. He fit there, and it makes me…calmer when he's lying there. I don't know why. Just makes me feel better.

Bokuyo crawled up my body and laid on my chest, putting his arms around me, and I to him so I could pull the blankets up over us. Comfortably, he snuggled against me, closing his eyes to become within minutes pressed under a deep sleep that I wished I could fall into again. My eyelids might've been heavy, and I might've been so comfortable I could die happy here, but I just couldn't fall back asleep. Something was nagging at my stomach. I felt like there was something _wrong. _Something that I should be taking care of or noticing, but couldn't actually quite grasp. It danced in and out of my perception, teasing me on the tip of my tongue like a word I had forgotten. The feeling that something terrible was happening made my whole body numb.

And then, the phone rang.

"UGGGGG," I groaned. It was pretty ironic that the receiver was on the side table next to the couch. Yeah, we have a freakin' landline—I can't afford a cell phone. Deal with it.

My hand reached behind me, fumbling for the receiver. In my effort to clasp it, I _knocked _it off of its resting place and had it fall to the ground just out of my reach, which was a signal to the phone that it was answered. If I moved now I'd totally wake Boku up, and…no. I groaned, reaching back with a muscle-exhausted arm, and smacked my hand over the dock for the phone in hopes I'd eventually find the speaker button without potentially opening a call that was rated _R _to my son's ears. I don't know where the button was, but suddenly, the room wasn't quiet. A voice from the phone on the floor filled the room.

"Hello? _Hellooo?" _

"What?" I snapped, loud enough for the phone to hear me. Bokuyo stirred his head on my chest. "Who is this?"

"Are you deaf? It's Cole!"

"Oh." My brother, who took it upon himself to call me when he felt like it but never return the calls I sent to him. I heard what little interest that was in my voice vanish."What do you want?"

"Is Zane with you?"

His distressed tone struck a chord on my already-uneasy dreading feeling that something was about to happen. "Why would Zane be with me?"

I heard him groan on the other end of the phone. His stressed breath told me that wasn't the right answer. "He won't answer his phone, and he left me a distressed voicemail message while I was in class."

"Define 'distressed."

"Who am I, _Siri? _I don't _know _what the definition of 'distressed' is!" Cole's obviously worried voice, full of distress and anxiety over his friend, told me that he didn't understand the blatant meaning of what I said. I rolled my eyes at the phone as if he were standing right there.

"I _meant, _what do you _mean_ by 'distressed,' bonehead?"

I envisioned Cole dragging a hand over his face, standing outside in front of his fancy-pants school, pacing back and forth over the asphalt when he really should be in class. "He was crying, begging for my help—something was definitely wrong. Zane doesn't just call over nothing he can't handle."

"Maybe he burned his casserole."

"Seiko! This is serious!" Cole sounded like he wanted to reach through the phone and smack me. "Has he called you?"

"I haven't checked my messages. What time is it?"

"It's around twelve."

"Really? When I last checked it was like nine or something." _But then again, you did take a nap…_

"Yeah, well, it's not." Cole's voice squinched with worry. "I don't know where he is, I don't know what's wrong with him—I tried calling Jay, but he didn't answer, and I tried calling Kai, but he _never _answers. Something happened. I just know it. I can feel it nagging in my stomach—I've felt it all day—"

It struck me frozen that Cole had had the same intuition that I did. Why were he and I both imagining that something was going to happen? I tried to play off my bewilderment with a little crude, bad humor that I knew I shouldn't say, but pretty much did anyway. "That's probably gas," I told him, stroking Bokuyo's head. He barely noticed that I was talking loudly to a phone on the floor. "Look, Cole, if you're so worried, go over to his house and check on him. I'm sure you'll find him burying his casserole in the backyard, mourning the loss of what could've been a great meal with flowers and a goodbye speech and everything."

"Seiko, will you _quit _with the sarcasm? This is _Zane _we're talking about."

"Oh, we're talking about Zane? I thought we were talking about Zane."

"KNOCK IT OFF. I'm going over there." I heard the sound of keys being jingled and a car door reacting when the handle was let go of abruptly. It slammed a second later, the keys moving filling my ears shortly afterward. An engine roared to life. _He's really worried, _I thought stupidly. My own feeling of dread that had emanated before became emancipated, growing rapidly every time I even thought about it to overthrow my heart. I was worried about Zane. Though he'd been a little creepy, it was a happy creepy that not many people have the ability to successfully pull off, and to that he was one of my friends, making me have a soft spot for such a free-liver.

"Call me if you find anything."

"Hear hear." Cole hung up.

I reached behind me and slapped my hand on buttons until the receiver shut off, feeling a little more empty now that I had this talk with Cole. I wouldn't have told him that, but I felt everything grow more intense with the thought of something happening to Zane. He didn't really _deserve _to be hurt. What if somebody had beat him up, and he was calling Cole for help, but when Cole didn't answer he was murdered and thrown in a lake where no one would find him?

Okay, that's a little farfetched. But…Something _did _happen. I just know it. I can feel it. The million dollar question now is _what. And_ why do I feel like Twinkies is somehow connected to this?

* * *

**It probably isn't a good idea that Cole goes to the monastery. ~foreshadowing. **

**Sorry we didn't hear about Zane yet. You already know why I didn't. So we'll hear about him next chappie~~ xD**

**I also realize that last time I said "Go have an awesome day/night," I forgot to put an exclamation mark to it made it look like I was being crabby when I said it. xD I wasn't. Consider it a typo.**

**And if FFN will let me put more than just 1 exclamation point...**

**PLEASE GO HAVE AN AWESOME DAY/NIGHT ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! THANKS FOR READING! xD**


	12. 11: the Survivor

**I've been working really hard on getting this chapter & the next chapter done. I've been really busy lately, but tonight I had some free time... So I'm having Emi upload these for me.**

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_11. The Survivor_

Zane could see _Four Weapons _standing tall in the distance over the fields where several civilians dug through light waters to find whatever they were harvesting; he wasn't quite sure exactly what kind of harvesting you were able to do when the weather was getting colder by the hour. Backed against the sun's golden rays, the small shelter shop that Kai and Nya used to describe to him as a refuge for their childhood was as strong as their personalities. It appeared to have gone renovation, taking away from the image that he remembered to have seen it once when he and his friends were sent back in time after Garmadon to stop him from altering their future. Zane was taken down by how much the dark bamboo-gutter-roofed resembled them, even if it was not a monument made in their honor. Its double-tiered rooftop of dark wood was what struck him as completely different than the last he'd visited. The lower layer was propped by bamboo and the upper was classic, inward-caved tiles in a pattern of three for every vertical section. The awning draping off the lower tier still created shady recess in front of the entry for which a table was laid out, appearing to be for smaller weapons to be displayed, although it was difficult to discern from so far away. Square wooden posts held up the looming awning, also serving for two other small tables squished between the post and the wall of the shop. Zane could not see what they were holding, other than the fact that the tables must be connected to the posts, since they had no legs. Unlike the last _Four Weapons _layout, it seemed that Kai had added a small porch on the left hand side of the building that wrapped around the corner, leading to a homey front door on the side. Where there used to be a long window with wooden dowels running all vertically and horizontally across it was now just a wall. And of course, there was the garage door-like front entrance to the shop, behind where the awning dawned the sign advertising the name in intricate Ninjean-written characters. The wide door was open, meaning the shop must be open, and Kai had to be home. The friend that Zane had not made contact with for five years was inside that building, right now, getting ready to sell stuff to make a living. _Kai was in that building._

Zane clung to the hill, a sudden anxiety washing over him. What if he went to the door, and Kai turned him the other way, despite the obvious situation that Zane was in? What if he turned him away, sent him packing, trying to make sure he kept everyone out of his life—what if Kai didn't _want _to see him?

_Then you'll have to make him listen, whether he wants to see you or not, _said a voice in Zane's head, and after a second of ambiguously distinguishing the voice he was startled to find that it sounded just like Yuki. He jumped. He knew for certain that the robot was not telepathically linked with his bonce, but for some reason, he was imagining his very voice advising him. Zane did not know what to think. _If he tells you to leave, you tell him that it doesn't matter whether he wants to see you or not—you're in trouble, and even if he won't give you help, you'll demand it. _

As if Yuki were standing right there waiting for a reaction, Zane nodded in understanding. He stood on the hill, looking down at the farmers working away, oblivious to his very presence and what revulsions he brought saddled to his back. Just one man, standing alone, on a hill—and he brought a lot of baggage with him with absolutely no physical evidence of it in his palms. What a strange thought to think that he, just one small entity in a sea of millions, carried such an enormous burden on him to these people who had absolutely nothing to do with the matter. They were just living about their normal lives, while Zane was here, waiting to screw it up. _That must be what it's like for Kai, _he realized suddenly, revisiting the idea of going down there to ask for his friend's help. _I'm barging into his daily life—probably very normal without me—just to bug him again with what he has been trying to fix himself away from. I am ruining what his blood, sweat, and tears have been the glue to mend. It has been a very strange evening, and I do not even mildly understand what is going on with it. I don't understand what happened to my brother or my sensei. I don't understand what it is that Yuki is so certain I need to be protected from. I don't understand what it is that I am running from, and yet here I am, ready to drag my friend into it along next to me when he's sworn himself off this type of uncanny comportment. I feel disgusting. _

Who was he kidding? He couldn't drag Kai into this.

_Oh, yes, you CAN. _Rikku's voice snapped into his head, loud, clear, and brotherly authoritative. Zane jumped again, startled out his wits by the boom of Rikku's unquestionable presence in his mind, though it was only a figmentation of grief's words being put into his head. Still, Zane obeyed the idea of listening to his brother's imaginary voice. Even if it _was _his subconscious trying to persuade him into doing what he didn't want to, Rikku was a frightening person when he was disobeyed—and real or unreal, Zane did not want to mess with him, just in case it really WAS Rikku poking around in his brain. _You ARE going down there, and you ARE going to barge into his life—You are his FRIEND, and friends HELP friends._

_What if he doesn't want me to? _Zane thought, doubting himself again. On cue by coincidence, he saw, in the large doorway of _Four Weapons, _a familiar shape walk into view, walking towards a shelf on the far right wall that could be seen from this angle. Zane was more than staggered to see the toned form of the ever-present, brown haired, oblique Kai bending over to rearrange samurai helmets on the shelf with a pair of bare hands. His back was to Zane, so he could not see his face, but he knew it was him the moment he saw the light shirt over a pair of light jeans, the belt of an apron wrapped around his waist, visible even from a distance. Zane stared. _Kai! _He thought, gasping out loud—so loud, in fact, that the harvesting people at the base of the hill finally noticed he was standing there by his outburst, snapping back their heads from the wade in water to stare. Zane's heart leaped. He hadn't seen Kai in so long. Excitement to lay eyes on a closer image of his friend transpired in his heart, strumming it faster in his chest. He did not expect himself to be so giddy. Had he convinced himself that Kai possibly _wasn't _there without knowing what his mind was doing underneath his nose? He had no expectation to actually _see _him, especially not right _now, _but there he was, standing up and turning away to something in the shop that hid him from Zane's eye.

_I just saw Kai, _he thought, and without knowing he was going to, his fears of bringing bad onto his friend slipped away into a river of nothing. It carried him closer to the edge of the hill. Then, without even taking another thought, Zane began to run.

He wasn't running because he was afraid of what dangers menaced behind him in the past, or that he was hurrying before his mind recapped why he shouldn't be doing this, bringing his own friend into this only for his fright of going it alone. He was running because he wanted to see Kai again. He did not know he missed him so much until he finally saw him again, saw him like this, in the flesh. He did not know that.

_Five years is a long time, _he grasped, his feet flinching over the rock path towards _Four Weapons. _Those in the water stared at him as he ran by, probably confused at why he was running like a madman for the front of a blacksmith's shop—they probably were trying to remember if there was a sale or not. But they'd never understand. Hopefully they'd never have to.

Zane saw Kai placing a spear staff against the wall that swallowed him from Zane's view, reordering something that was out of place, out of view; with a start, Zane realized that he couldn't turn back now. He was too close to give up on seeing Kai again. His scared heart swallowed itself whole, and Zane ran faster.

Kai's bent-over back straightened when he finished fixing something on the floor. That was all Zane saw from back here. The blacksmith's hand wrapped over the back of his tense shoulder, groping against the pain in one of his muscles, and Zane saw it as a trigger for what was to happen, having noted it in many of his sociology classes. They could not persist back-to-face any longer. Kai turned around, leaving behind the spear to the wall's disposal, and faced the door. This was the moment in which he would see Zane, running his fastest he could down the path towards the shop he once struggled to lift, for the first time in many years. This was it. No going back now.

Zane couldn't hold in his childish excitement any longer.

* * *

Cole didn't know why he felt it, but there was an eerie pit sitting in his stomach that flinched at the silence surrounding the monastery.

He stood in front of the wide gate, clasped shut at the hook, trying to figure out why he couldn't remotely detect any sense of sound coming from the inside of the monastery. Being a twenty-five year old vampire who had hearing better than any creature on earth, he should've been able to detect even the _slightest _pound of Zane's heartbeat—the only heartbeat past these gates, that is—from inside the monastery, but it was dead silent in there. There was no trace of human habits from beyond this door. There weren't even the noises of living birds dawdling in the trees, shaking amongst the squirrels, chirping with rapid heartbeats drumming in their breasts from the trees at the base of the mountain. That was what was scaring Cole the most: there was just…_nothing. _Like nobody, not even the animals, lived here. And having jetted here past the provided speed limit on the high of Zane's frightened voicemail, the sounds of the living would be reassuring right about now.

_Why can't I hear him? _Cole thought, grabbing onto the handle of the monastery's wooden gate and pulling with every ounce of superhuman strength he could muster, trying to let all those afternoons of weight-lifting pay off just for this moment. His fingernails dug into the side of the handle, turning his knuckles white. The door, squeaking with unjust remonstrations, took its time moving very slowly beyond Cole's reach, but it did not put as much a strain into him as he thought it would've. The loud tear of the gate, which was mechanically rigged—meaning, this door was only ever opened with a computer that activated its open or close from the inside of the monastery—would've scared the birds out of their trees from below. Cole threw a hopeful glance over his shoulder, hoping to find them absconding the scene at the start of the screech. He was sorrowfully disappointed.

_Please, please, please be okay…_ Cole begged his mind. When a crack big enough for his wide body to slip through was visible, he didn't waste time zipping inside, stirring nothing but the air in his wake of vampire speed. And the tableau amid the courtyard was much more macabre cadaverous than he expected. It stopped him dead in his tracks. But maybe _dead _was too strong of a word to use.

Bodies caked the ground in oil, machine parts, and utter chaotic destruction of total massacre. That was the first thing that Cole noticed. Too many bodies excreted the oil that outlined the cracks of the cobble ground, turning their glue a deep black. Heads, arms, legs, chests, hands were _scattered _all over the place, seeming that something extremely large and angry had come upon a scene it was not happy with and decided to reign terror on the remains of the already-deceased victims. More than thirty bodily pieces had to be chucked around the quad. Cole was disgusted, was _horrified _to see lifeless heads, lifeless parts staring back at him, their face cast in a final plea that was met and answered with only death. He felt tears sting his eyes. Something _horrible _had happened here.

The next thing he was able to take in was hard to distinguish the purpose of at first, until Cole realized that the giant, destroyed mechanical machines he was seeing were the pieces to the Spinjitzu course. They were torn down and pummeled like monuments destroyed in a riot. The spinning-dummy trainer was completely ripped in half, with the top part of the carousel punched to one side of the common and the bottom half stepped on. The dummies dangled uselessly from the roof of it, tipped onto its side against the monastery's wall, a signal of their ending days come true. The pegs jutting from the ground that Cole remembered having the hardest time mastering were all crushed. Cracked, fallen to the ground, standing still, strewn about the scene uselessly. It looked to Cole that a giant had come up here and stepped on top of all of them, leaving few standing, probably the few that peeked between his toes. The rest of the course was hardly describable anymore; Cole couldn't tell which part was which, because they were so ravaged by whatever demon had come in here that they no longer held resemblance to the production they once were.

The final thing that Cole noticed was the horrible, gut-wrenching, vomit-inducing smell. It was worse for his sensitive nose, which picked up on more scents than human noses did. It smelled _rotten, _like a corpse's skin after leaving it out in the Sea of Sand to bake for two days. After being a vampire for so long and becoming accustomed to the smell of it, having initiated it himself, Cole knew exactly what the rotting smell was without any hesitation, any time needed to try to crack the case. He didn't have to smell it twice to know it. It was Death. It seemed to have swept its cologne over the courtyard, leaving its scent in the wake—the Devil had decided to stomp in here today, and he'd left a surprise for Cole. Just for him…

_What…what happened here? _Cole's stretched heart stung. He moved his feet tenderly around the body parts and the rubble of debris, holding his breath so he wouldn't have to countlessly take in the smell. It made him want to throw up the blood bag contents that he'd sucked down this morning. (He no longer drank from the vein. He stole blood drive donation bags from the hospital instead, compelling doctors and nurses to forget that he was ever there after taking his fill. That way, no one got hurt. And, after watching _Bambi _with Rie twice, he knew there was no way in Hell he was going to go eat the animals in the forest, like those sparkling self-righteous interpretations of vampires that were popular with the kids nowadays.) He moved around the destroyed robots that he'd never met before, leaving them pace after pace with guilt sitting in his stomach. _If this happened to the droids…_He thought, feeling himself get sicker, but not with the smell. _And Zane left me such a scared message… Oh, god. Zane…Please be okay… _

On his way to the door of the monastery, Cole's foot hit something hard. He looked down slowly, letting his gaze skim down the air without intending to be theatric. His heart genuinely didn't want to see what he'd almost tripped over, but his eyes were too curious to let him get away with it.

Cole's eyes fell upon what blocked his path, and he screamed.

* * *

Yuki knelt on the floor in the middle of the monastery's "bridge." He didn't know why everyone insisted on naming it "the bridge;" after all, it was no place for crossing over a river or gaping hole, and it was no proportionate room of a boat; his argument that it was a stupid name had gone without much ado. Nobody had taken to listening to him that a room full of machines, particularly a large flat screen that could track anything that the droids had set it out to find, was not to be named after a construction of passing. It always bothered him that nobody listened to his voice.

Now, there was nobody left to listen to him.

They were scattered everywhere. Master Wu usually ordered that there be droids posted in the "bridge" to detect any sight of danger or misbehavior in Ninjago using the large television screen that was hooked up to all the giant generator-looking box-machine-things that were posted on the wall near it, no doubt related to the computer. Yuki never was one to be familiar with how machinery worked. It was not his field of skill.

But, much like the equipment in this room, every single one of the droids—they, alongside all the others in the monastery—that were positioned in this room for the day were butchered.

Massacred.

The sight was sickening, similar to that you'd see in a horror movie. Words couldn't describe how awful it was to look at. Yuki had already waded through the river of bodies in the hallways, on the staircases, and in the rooms to know that this place was no exception to the murders of every single one of Yuki's robotic brothers and sisters. He'd already seen every single one of them handled the same way that those contained to this room were treated. He had already been crying tearlessly by the time he got here. But this is the place where he finally broke down.

They were torn apart. Oil splattered the walls like blood. Arms, feet, hair, heads, shorn-off skin, and every single aspect of their bodies were distributed over the room. Wires. Gears. Things like that, they owned the floors beside mounds of carcass. The machines that the people in this room were supposed to be watching were bashed in. The looks of it said a large fist had smashed into it out of anger. Somebody had gotten angry. Somebody had a tantrum, and all of Yuki's "family" became the nearest targets.

There was nothing but fragments left.

Yuki knelt on the floor, in his lap the beautiful face of one of his friends—one of the people at this monastery that respected him. He fingered her eyebrows in sorrow, dusted her hair back from her face with his lip bobbing uncontrollably. He was one of the few droids that did not have tear ducts, but his body knew what it felt to cry, and he mimicked the act without precipitation. He dusted oil streaks from her cheeks, making sure her eyes were shut; her head, snapped at the neck, was not connected to the body that lain in the heaps of indeterminate remains. He did not know which body parts belonged to her. And that was one of the most miserable ways to be discovered.

Yuki's mind was blank, stroking her cheek with his thumb, staring out before him at the last of nothing he could see. All he could barely muster to think was: _I lied to Zane. I lied to him. I told him that he could fix them when he got back. I told him everyone would be fine, that they'd be okay. But he can't fix this. I lied to him._

He couldn't feel the guilt, but he knew it was there.

Ming had always been so nice to him when everyone else seemed to against him. That is how it always had been. She was the first of the robots to ever accept him into the family of clockwork people; eventually, she'd won Rikku, her unintentionally-abrasive husband, over to be nice to Yuki before the two finally became close friends. When Yuki had first been built, all the others that Dr. Julien created scorned him—particularly Zane—without getting to know him. They didn't like him, firsthand, because of how feminine he was, how useless they believed he would be to the Clockwork Army's purposes. They believed that he didn't have the ability to serve the purpose of their creation, to _kill_—and they were right. Yuki _hated _fighting. He hated war, he hated violence. He hated everything that had to do with that. He peacefully kept to himself, wishing away that he was dead instead of being trapped in the body of a stupid droid, while using his time to mess with herbs instead of going outside to train in combat with everyone else. He was the outsider. No one liked him because they believed that Dr. Julien made him for no reason.

At first, Yuki believed just that. Until Ming had finally one day scrounged up the time to step up to him. He had thought she was just trying to make fun of him when she politely inquired about his practices, using falsetto for her interest in his herbs, just like all the other robots who childishly preyed upon him. At this time, he was still in shock, still feeling, with his whole humanity switch, the effects of grief, of being murdered and taken away from Mitsuko just when they were supposed to run away together, to begin their new world. Yuki had been told that Zane had killed her—he hadn't, under the watchful eye of his older brother, who said killing Mitsuko would be purposeless—and was still trying to wrap his head around the idea that his lover had been slain. He'd only been told that to keep away his interest for going to look for her in his robot state. (Mitsuko had been held back as they had killed Yuki before her sweet, innocent blue eyes. Seeing him would've been a shock to her still living, devastated heart…But he didn't know that.) Ming was the first to reach out to him, the first to try to become his friend. She didn't care what everyone else thought. She was nice to Yuki.

They bonded quickly. Ming had once brought up, when Yuki was feeling miserable (feeling nonetheless) believing he was created for no reason, that Yuki was the only robot out of _every one _of Julien's creations that had the ability to feel human emotion. He'd been startled to hear this, of course. He thought everyone had that same problem. But no, sadly; it was only him, he who was condemned by others, making the idea of feeling a hell of a lot worse. She told him that he _had _to be created for a reason, because Julien gave him that ability, and it was not just to test out the infliction to see if it would work, installing emotion into a robot. Never had the inventor _ever _done that same procedure on another droid that he created after Yuki. Doubtful, he thought it was because Julien didn't like the creation after all and decided not to pursue it in any more projects; alas, Ming relented that his theory was incorrect. She believed, wholeheartedly, that Yuki was created like this for a reason. He was _chosen _for a reason, unlike the rest of them, who had been victims of Arachnaeus. Julien made him for some reason, picked _him _for some reason. Why? He never found out.

Ming was his first friend. Yuki respected her more than himself, calling her "senpai" and "sama" and, in his younger days, "hime-sama." He looked up to her. She taught him how to live with being a robot, for crying out loud. He believed that she had a part of God inside of her, a part that had not been installed, but carried with her soul into her next robot life. She was kind, caring, and never negatively hurt anyone unless they asked for it. She, alongside Rikku, was his best robot friend.

And now…She was dead.

Yuki stroked her face in his lap, oil coating the robes of his white kimono. He wanted to say he was sorry. He wanted to say that even though he had not been able to order a goodbye, he always had her in his heart. Er, whatever. He could've helped her. _I wish I could tell you how strongly I felt that I needed to extract Zane from the situation first, _he thought, placing his index and middle fingers on both of her temples, _willing _her to hear. _I wish I could tell you how sorry I am that I let this happen to you. You only ever did good for me. Now I repay you with abandonment with a monster. I cannot imagine how scared you must've been…_

The two most important women in Yuki's life had been killed. His lover, and his best friend. Gone. Ruined.

Did the universe not like him? Did it want revenge upon him for some reason? Did it hate him? He felt as though that were the case. He did not feel that it was on his side.

_I am so sorry._

Then, he sensed it. An inhuman presence inside the monastery's walls. Yuki's head snapped up, honing in on the deep sense of one; yes, there was an inhuman nearby. A supernatural creature was lurking. The killer. It had to be.

_I know I hate fighting, _he thought, setting Ming's head gently on the ground beside him. _I know I do. But I've had it up to here with the people I love being hurt. _The peaceful herbalist stood up, feeling the sense pound against him, drawing him closer to it, beckoning with a devilish smile and crooked finger. It was _asking _him to come destroy it. _I lost Mitsuko twice, _he thought, stepping over his friends, face empty. _I lost Rikku once. I lost Ming now, too. I am not going to tolerate such—such bull-crap. I am done with this. I will avenge them all. _Yuki's emotionless insides clenched. His body stiffened into rage-mode, battle mode. His body was ready to fight as it was when the Reckoning began. He would not, _could _not suffer anymore. He was _tired _of being pushed around by people who thought they were more important than him, tired of being bullied by those who figured their existence was the more crucial of points and he should go down first if the opportunity of death came. People who presumed he did not matter.

This day would be forever engraved into his history beside the Reckoning, a place where he often did not want to venture; it marked a day where yet again Yuki was torn down by things that did not want him to love. His fist clenched so tightly that his danger sensors went off on his eyes, indicating that there was intense pressure and pain applied to his palms (by his nails.) He ignored the stimuli telling him to remove the source of pain before it tore through his false skin, the skin that had outlasted things far more dire than just his puny _nails _pushing against it—his skin was stronger than that. It would have to be if he could move past this ugly day.

The day that would fall forever as the Clockwork Massacre.

He was the last of the Clockwork Army, opposite as Zane Montgomery had been the first. Once upon a time, Zane had sworn that he'd be the last robot standing. But he was wrong by many many years.

Yuki Akamatsu was the only survivor. And he'd be sure that, unlike Zane yet again, he'd avenge every last one of the people he'd lost today, people who may not have respected him well, but people nonetheless. If war was what the universe wanted when it kept attacking Yuki to tear him down, then _dammit, _even if he hated fighting, war was what the hell they were going to get.

* * *

**Notes from Emi: :-D**

We really got a glimpse deeper into Yuki's character today, didn't we? We really got to feel how deep Yuki's trauma goes, not only about losing his friends, but about how tough he's had it. Life has not been a picnic for him. I can see what he means when he says it feels like the universe is against him (or maybe that's just Kairi ;D) cuz he's been torn apart by everyone. I feel closer to him now.

Plus, how epic is that?! DOTN stated that Zane swore he'd be the last nindroid in the Clockwork Army, but he's not. That's kinda funny. :-P and epic.

Okay. Anyway. Kairi loves hearing feedback on the chapters from you guys, she loves you all, she's been really busy lately so she hasn't been able to do much, but she just wrote two AWESOME chapters that make me like die. So please leave her a review, know that she reads them all and smiles for every one she reads. You guys always make her day.

**Go have an awesome day/night, on behalf of Kairi and myself!**

_***P.S She wants me to give a shout out to **__**Random Ninja Wizard Girl**__** as the NFAN fan of the week! xD CONGRATS! **_


	13. 12: When Your Past

**_Graaahhhh_**** Em-Emi is uploading again. :-D Hi all! **

* * *

_12. When Your Past Comes Back to Haunt You_

Cole stumbled backwards, unheeding to the things he was kicking on his way back, such as the bodies and the feet and the numerous phalanges and debris. In fact, he wanted nothing more than to stumble his way back out the damn gate, into his car, and back to school so he could forget any of this. He'd stopped with the ninja shit for a reason. It was too stressing, too dangerous, too heartbreaking, and too deadly for him to continue as a possible career choice. People around him dropped like friggin' flies when he assumed the title of a ninja. As an actor, people stayed the frick _alive. _But as a ninja—hell, no. He'd rather have stopped ninja-ing around when the Overlord was dead. He should've stayed the _hell _away from it. He should've hung up the suit the second that he, Kai, Jay, and Zane crashed at Misako's place that night. He should've just fucking backed out. Then, he never would've gotten messed up in ANY of this.

Five years may have passed, but it didn't stop the nightmares that Cole had.

Yeah, yeah; laugh all you want. Big Bad Cole has nightmares about ninjas. But it's not like that. It's about the experiences he's _had _as a ninja, the things he's seen, the people whose graves he's stood over, the demons he's handled. And added to that, the fact that pretty much all the hardships he had faced were just part of a huge, fake plot scheme, riddled by Kaos the Deadly and his power to create realistic mirages to multiple subjects at once. Everything that he'd gone through was all just a frigging _lie. _It made him think, for many months, that he was insane, and _none _of this was real; maybe _he _was the one locked up in Sunnyside. Or maybe he was in there with Seiko, living his own fantasies, never leaving his inner world to visit the real one. Maybe this whole damn thing was just a figment of _his _imagination. If Kaos could do it, why couldn't Cole?

Cole shut the door on being a ninja when Kaos was defeated. He had zipped the last of it when he shut his suitcase, leaving the monastery forever to shadow a better life outside of tragedy. He left it all behind to try to be as normal as a vampire can get. Try to live out the fantasy a little while, until people started to notice that the frozen twenty-year-old wasn't aging. Maybe he'd move to that place called Italy and start a new life there. Or maybe he'd move to Brazil. He had options. He didn't know. He was supposed to deal with that NORMAL STUFF as it came along instead of watching it flush down the drain before him—or, rather, get chucked about like the place he stood in now.

Cole fell to his knees and retched his insides out onto the ground until he couldn't vomit anymore, his back facing the monastery's door. His heaving stomach twisted. _I didn't want to see this, _he thought, tears stinging the corners of his eyes. His mind danced with the image of what had stopped him in his tracks when his toe had stubbed it.

Cole had looked down, finding a scream rising up in his throat before he could hold it down, a cry of surprise that echoed throughout the empty air, channeling through the empty forest below the monastery's height. His eyes had fallen into two terrified ones, two that were connected to a face that was connected to a neck that was attached to a torso, ripped apart at the hips. For a second, the familiar blue eyes, staring up at him blankly, had not registered in his mind. And then, all he could simply do was scream.

Cole kept his crying eyes away from the looks of the body. He wanted to cry more, but he was too shocked to be able to. He pulled his knees to his chin, head pounding with the beginnings of a headache starting to ebb at his eyes, and sat there, staring out at the body in a different world. His head was somewhere else, trying to convince himself that this wasn't real. The face of someone Cole had known, looked up to, and loved deeply had no wise words to give; his cheek was slashed across by what looked like an animal's large claws, his chest dug into by those same weapons in vain. His open panel was stripped bare of its workings and hinged door so that it may be nothing but a gaping square in his chest. His mouth was open in an eternal silent scream. His eyes were empty, filled with death.

Cole buried his face. He couldn't look anymore.

How many more times would his loved ones die before he became immune to the feeling?

_I wanted out of this, _he thought, crying into his arms. _I wanted OUT. Kai had the right idea, cutting off from all of us; by doing that, he ensured he'd never get hurt by any of this again. I wanted out…_

_There is something beautiful about all scars of whatever nature. A scar means the hurt is over, the wound is closed and healed, done with, _some wise person once said. Cole's scars had been closed. They'd been sealed shut. They weren't beautiful, but they were shut. And now, with those claws that left marks over every body here, they were torn wide open, and bled out onto the earth.

Cole numbly remembered pulling out his phone from his pocket and dialing a number, but he didn't know which one he called. He held the phone to his ear without knowing he did. He stared at the body, crying, without hearing anything. He didn't know he spoke. He didn't know he thought. He was there, but simply just was not.

"Hello?"

"He's gone."

"Uh…okaayyy…Do you mind, I dunno, _specifying _what you mean?"

"They ripped him in half and took everything out of him."

"What?! Out of who? Cole? What happened?"

"…He's gone."

"Cole? Hey, listen to me. Who's gone? What are you talking about? Why does your voice sound so weird?"

"They killed him. I don't know who. But he's dead. Dead…" He was sobbing again. At least, he thought he was.

"Cole! Tell me! Who killed him? Who is this _him _you're talking about? You're not acting, are you? 'Cause if you are…You're freaking me out."

And then, in his ear, the voice changed. It was not the one he'd been listening to, but a different voice—a voice he knew well, one that tingled in his heart and made his body freeze, on a normal day. A voice he was still getting used to not hearing every day. A voice that once made his chest constrict and his body relax and his heart pound every time it spoke.

"Cole? Cole, what's wrong?"

"Nya…" His voice cracked. He stared at the body, trembling inches from his own vomit. The world around him was spinning so fast he was about to faint. "Somebody was here."

"Who was there?"

"Where is 'here', by the way?" Was that Jay? Was that who Cole had called? He didn't know. He couldn't tell.

"Zane called me…he was scared. Something was wrong. I came … so much destruction…"

"You mean the monastery?" Jay. It had to be him.

"What happened to Zane? Where is he?" Nya…

"I don't…" Cole stared at the body. "I don't know…"

"We need to call the police, Cole."

Cole nodded in agreement, like Nya could see him. She sounded scared.

"Jesus Christ, Nya…" He ran his empty hand over his sweaty face, pale and covered with the sticky dew. His heart was making his lungs unresponsive to breathing properly. "…he's dead." His voice squeaked, saying it.

Pause. "What?"

"No…Zane can't be dead!" Jay spoke loudly, clearly into the phone. "No!"

"Not Zane…" Cole's senses tingled. He felt that there was a threat nearby, but couldn't make himself care. "Not Zane."

"Who?" Nya prompted quickly.

He removed his hand from his face and stared into the light, empty blue eyes again, staring at the sky feet away from his body, pulled taut from it. _I never thought I'd see your dead body again, _he thought, tears blurring his vision from actually seeing the corpse. It traded the real, sharp colors for blurred misconceptions in pictures that didn't make sense. Cole could only whisper it barely, but knew that the Walkers could hear it. _"Sensei."_

The response he got was not one that made sense at all. He thought it came from the earpiece on his phone, upon first conception.

"DIE, YOU MURDERER! _DIE!" _

Not to usually take the cliché literally, but Cole felt something stab into his back, sharp and cold. Straightening his spine responsively, he gasped into the phone, dropping it quickly out of his hands for it to plummet to the cobbles, leaving Nya and Jay to scream muffled questions at him out the earpiece. Surely they had heard the loud claim shouted through the air from behind Cole and were worried about what exactly that was about. When the sharp blade, attacking from behind him, was pulled out, Cole fell to the side. Being a vampire, nothing could kill him unless it was wooden and driven through his heart, meaning this stab wond would heal completely within seconds and wouldn't hurt past then. On command of the feel of a blade pierce his skin, his vampire instincts emerged, allowing him to jump from the ground the second he knew he was healed, whirl, and bare his fangs menacingly at his attacker. Cole's face contorted. Eyes turning to liquid, piercing silver and pupils shrinking to needlepoint, the veins under his eyes became visible, and his fangs protruded longer upon command. He curved his body in a protective crouch, hooking his fingers like claws. He let out an animalistic snarl from his throat.

"GRRAAHHH!" His attacker threw a large kitchen knife at him. With great aim, mind you, it stuck directly into Cole's shoulder, making him hiss in pain and have to grab the hilt of the knife and yank it out, letting it clatter to the ground before he pounced. His heavy body slammed against that of his white-clad aggressor, whom he shoved to the ground, pinning him to the ground effortlessly by his fingers. He bared his fangs and hissed into the face of who was daring enough to come at him with a kitchen cleaver.

And then, just like that, Cole stopped. His neck reared back in surprise. Around his fangs, he could muffle, "Yuki?!"

Yuki's wide eyes looked up at him strangely, observing Cole's vampiristic features retreating back into the façade of his normal appearance. The vampire quickly let off of the droid, but kept an eye on him. Why was Yuki here? More importantly, what was with the attack on Cole?

Yuki sat up, dazed and confused himself. The two men stared at each other for a minute, trying to gather their wits, until the discomfort was broken by Cole. "What the hell are you doing?"

Yuki's long white hair was disheveled from its usual pristine ponytail. The short chunks he normally kept contained to the sides of his thin face were not neatly lying flat. His white robes were matted by thick black oil. Face white, sandy eyes adjusting, the healer leaned back on his hands, looking weary of Cole, who typically didn't go off like that on friends. "I thought you were the murderer," he said flatly. "I sensed an inhuman, and attacked."

"The murderer?" Cole asked dryly, thinking, gut wrenchingly, of Sensei's mangled body behind him. He didn't dare a look backward.

Yuki looked down at the knife that Cole had chucked hastily to the side. "I know not of its identity. But it killed everyone."

"Everyone?" Cole's tone gave way to his worry and shock, but particularly the hopeful pinpoint he was trying to suggest on finding Zane's whereabouts. _Killed everyone, _he repeated mindfully, numbing at the core. _Zane…_

"I am the only robot left. They are all as destroyed as they are out here." He waved his hand to the pieces around them. "Every last one of them is nothing but pieces in a pool of parts inside the building." Yuki said quietly. His naturally soft voice would've been hard for a human to hear when it dropped down to barely a whisper. It rose up again for his next few sentences. "I can sense that you are worried about Zane. Don't. He's fine. He is in Ignacia, with Kai. I dropped him off there."

_With…Kai? _Cole's spinning head had more questions than could be counted. Why did he go to Kai? What happened? What about the phone call? Who did this? Why did Yuki "drop him off"? Cole was suspicious, but too drained to be questionably suspicious. He stared painfully at Yuki's empty face and realized, _He feels just like I do. He's hurting. _

Cole was never good with offering consolement to people. He didn't know how to verbally empathize. Plus, Yuki gave him a _screw off _look when he glanced up at Cole. "Quit thinking that."

"Thinking what?" Cole asked, surprised.

"That I look pitiful. That I am hurt. I can see what you're thinking all over your face." Yuki's face grew cold in a way that Cole had never seen before. This unique robot normally assumed position of a passivist: quiet, trying to keep away from fighting, someone who wasn't really violent or cruel or vile. But the dangerous, unearthly look contaminating his face made even the vampire a little scared. He looked like an avenging angel, prepared for ruin. "I do not want pity. I do not want it."

"Hear, hear," Cole thought, drowning in his own swallowed tears.

Yuki's face fell flat. _He is really hurt, _he thought. _Or pissed. Probably both. The look on his face says how hateful he is right now. _Yuki's curled lip, despising eyes, acted with the volatile body position said that he was ready to tear apart who did this to his friends, which explained why he didn't hesitate stabbing Cole. Yuki looked into the massacre distantly. "Did you see him?" he asked.

"Who?" Cole retorted.

"_Rikku. _Did you see Rikku." Yuki's eyes scanned the ground in the horizon beyond Cole. He shook his head torpidly.

"I didn't."

"Rikku was whole when I left." Yuki stood up. "But then again, so was everyone else."

"Why did you leave?" Cole refused to turn around to watch Yuki walk around, searching for a corpse among corpses. If he did, he'd see Sensei, and his control—so minimal currently—would be loosed. Hell would ravage if he lost control. Keeping a grip so tight that it hurt on his knees, Cole remained sitting, staring at nothing. He probably scared the shit out of Jay and Nya with that, and not answering them. He didn't feel like grabbing his phone to end it, though…

Behind his back, Yuki's voice was far away. He devoured the ground with his eyes, looking for Rikku. "I needed to keep Zane safe from _it."_

"It?" repeated Cole.

"The demon-mist-thing. It started this by attacking us…we only barely escaped. I took Zane to the safest place he could think of, Ignacia, and returned here for the others whom had not been injured the first time around when this hellish mist appeared. I returned to what looked like a mongrel destroyed the place. I know that it could not have been the mist that did it. The mist had an accomplice."

"How do you know?" Cole asked. Yuki's backwater voice answered stonily.

"That mist may have been strong, but it didn't have claws, and it didn't have the ability to rip people in half." Yuki groaned in frustration. "I can sense that it was not working alone. I was able to gain assistance from some roots and stop it from attacking us long enough so we can escape—"

"Wait a second." Cole impeded the story-telling at the sign of the first unsensible thing he heard come out of Yuki's mouth. "Did you just say _roots?"_

"Over there." Cole turned his head, barely, seeing Yuki pointing to something by the front gate. He followed the line of his finger towards a gnarled, bent over looking construction of what appeared to be manufactured, as he said, completely out of _roots—_roots that bent over and curved in a ball-like formation, as if over something. But one side had been busted through, leaving destroyed twigs and a hole in the side of it. Cole frowned, peering at Yuki out the corner of his eye, before getting up to get a closer look. He made sure not to look at Sensei. _Gotta keep my cool. Leaders keep their cool…_

They were definitely roots. What kind of roots, Cole couldn't tell. But they'd been broken through by something _big _and _strong, _definitely determined to seep out. His fingers pricked at the pointy edges. "Where did this come from?" He asked, sniffling, heart gaping.

"The ground. I don't know…One second the mist was killing me, and the next those things came out. I don't know how they were able to stop it, but they covered it, buying us time to run." Yuki rummaged through things, looking like he was sifting through dirty laundry. His face no longer gave way to any sadness Cole had seen before.

"You mean it just came out of nowhere?"

"Did you not understand that I just specified that indirectly?" Yuki bent down, kicking things away. His back faced Cole. _How are we going to tell Zane? _Cole suddenly wondered, knowing this would crush him. Hell, he felt so crushed himself…

He turned back to the root monument. They'd torn through the ground at the base of the root, like they'd sprouted up by themselves. It didn't look like they'd been ripped out. Cole's mind prickled with a thought—but it was stupid. There was no way—"Yuki, did you do this?" _You idiot. Don't BLURT stuff out like that! Especially such a stupid question! Of COURSE he didn't—_

"Do what?" Cole didn't look to see him turn from his dead-digging.

"This." He fingered the roots, sheepish. He sounded like a total idiot. _Yes, Cole. Yuki, a robot, totally made these roots come out of the ground by reaching into the dirt past the rock ground and managed to successfully do it without making a mess or wasting time. You caught him red handed. He's a magician in disguise. _

"I would reckon not."

Of course not. There you go. It was something else that did this. But Cole couldn't shake the feeling that Yuki _had _done this, by a strange, unknown power or something. Like when Cole commanded the Earth. But that would be stupid. It's not like Yuki was an elemental ninja or anything. He was just a healer, who dealt with herbs and plants all the time—

_That's pretty much a coincidence. You're looking into something that doesn't exist. Now…get your phone…Go help look for Rikku…Try to do something normal, Cole. We need to make sure Zane is okay, figure all this out then. You need to be a leader. Yuki is hurt, you're hurt, and you know Zane and the others are going to be too. You need to look out for your team and your friends. You need to…to do something for them. You owe them. _Cole turned towards Yuki. There was a loud clutter as something was pushed aside.

Digging through the end, Yuki had found something. He was kneeling, hands running over what Cole could assume was part of Rikku. He evaded the bodies quickly enough to make it over there within few seconds. And lo and behold…

"He's in one piece," Yuki whispered. He sounded relieved.

"At least." _But he'll have to be fixed somehow. Jay can probably help do that; he's good with robots and stuff like that. It'll give him something to tinker with to keep his mind off of…this…and Zane can help…_

Cole sighed. He knelt down, helping the surprisingly-strong Yuki lift up the heavy metal body underneath their arms. He was buried underneath things, which is probably why he was in one peace; whatever rampaged upon the monastery's inhabitants must not have been able to see him. What Cole was afraid of was what kind of creature could cause such damage to such a huge quantity of people. What was big enough to do this, with the motivation? It was large, that was just about all they knew at the moment.

Cole sighed again, feeling his body grown more and more weighted by the second. Not because he was holding Rikku, either. There was more to it than that. He felt everything normal in his world slip out of his fingers like sand, billowing away into the wind. _I guess this means that my vacation away from being a ninja is…over._

* * *

**Aaaannndd just like that, Kairi stabs us all in the back. Thanks, Kairi, for being mean to us. ;-; My life feels officially over. Just like Cole's vay-cay. **

**Go have an awesome day/night!**

***Congrats to ****Random Ninja Wizard Girl **** as the NFAN fan of the week! YAAAYYYYY! xD**


	14. 13: Someone You Can Trust

**Happy Halloween, guys! xD**

* * *

_13. Someone You Can Trust_

The second thing that Kai felt upon contact, something soft and silky cavorting the cartilage at the end of his nose, was the sudden backdrop of his shoulder blades hitting something in which beforehand had played with nothing but the material of his shirt, now becoming one with something steely under his body. A thunderous _thud _shook his collected wits out of their container. What else could he have done but become startled by his sudden push downwards, introduced by the shove of someone else's body barreling into his with great strength behind the jump it took to get there? Kai's head spun, having cracked hard to the floor, in circles that wouldn't stop, not even long enough to quite recollect the distinct smell of ash and soap that went flying into his nose. He knew the smell, strangely enough, and had a nebulous thought as to whose pale sandy hair was rustling against his nose—but he wasn't quite ready to face the consequences of deductive reasoning just yet. Kai waited for the storm in his head to calm first.

Meanwhile, the paperweight holding him down wrapped two strong arms around him and squeezed for dear life, no doubt some sort of attack to try and take down the last of Kai's breath, rendering him unconscious. It may have been years since Kai even needed to use his own inner defensive system, and he might've been disabled now (there was a high-pitched ringing in his good ear and his only eye was blurry), but his body already acted on itself without waiting to recover after the slam. His muscles tensed prematurely for what his mind, uncovering dust over the ninja-defense rulebook that he'd tried so hard to stuff into a corner, began to activate. _I'd been bullied time and time again by danger, _a thought sparked the fire in his eye. _Time and time again, I've been knocked down when I thought I was at my strongest. I was vulnerable moments ago—I let my guard down. _

_Idiot, your guard has BEEN down. _The resentful voice of misfeasor lashed out, the devil on his shoulder. Kai had no time to listen to a pointy-tailed nuisance bicker with a halo-hidden bird hovering over his arms. Within seconds, without even being able to know that he was moving quicker than a bolt of lightning, Kai's body took out the rest, doing what it had done three years ago to every jump or scare he got: whanging on whatever had done something to him, be it real or not. As someone so negatively effected by the events in his past, Kai often was jumpy; he'd begun to relax a little after he had met Anya, but now… Sheesh. Talk about a relapse.

Kai flipped the familiar weight off him, untangling the arms of the blonde-headed assailant from around him and pinning them to the ground, slamming them to the wood so hard that he heard the familiar split of the boards underneath him screaming his name. The muscles under his light work shirt tightened for the first sign of defense on his assailant's part. To lessen the chances of that, Kai pinned him at the hips by straddling the pale pair of white pants he saw clad to his jumper, digging inwards his nails to the retaliator's wrists to cause them reason to not wait for more. His face automatically twisted into a nasty snarl of scorn to add to his quick attack. _I haven't done this in a long time, _Kai thought, mind flashing back to the news he'd received from Anya yesterday morning about her nefarious brother planning to strike against Kai for marrying his sister. Something that, ages ago, Kai might've thought about once or twice—if he hadn't known Jay beforehand.

Kai was ready to do what he could to hold off before he could find a way to call the police—let them handle an arbitrary hugger however they wanted; he certainly wouldn't dictate this in his own hands—when his brain finally connected the image in front of him to cognition. A pair of wide, petrified icy blue eyes stared up at him under parted, thin bangs, almost asking him, _What the hell are you DOING? _Kai finally understood how to put a name to the scent, light boned face, pale hair, and the not-really-making-a-dent squeeze around his waist. But by the time Kai's own usable eye grew wide, seizing knowledge of who had jumped him, there was the sudden jerk of his slacked fingers around his old friend's wrists that freed them. A second later, the heels of two hands shoved roughly into his chest—daresay knocking the wind out of him—and Kai went flying backwards through the air, crashing into the table just behind them. His head, again, knocked against the wood so hard that he did hear ringing in his final ear, church bells singing some err tune with the drums protected by sinew. He gasped out loud. _God, that hurt so much. _The stinging in his head wouldn't give way first.

"I am sorry, my brother, but you seem to be a bit jumpy," said that kind, level voice that Kai had forsaken since the day he'd attended Jay and Nya's wedding, camouflaged in the background. The one that Kai had sort of missed to hear the most, wishing he could take advice from the young-but-wise friend of his that had lived more than one life. Kai waited for his leftover vision to stop blurring, blotting out with dots, while thinking about what he was supposed to say. "I'm sorry"? Was he supposed to gasp and cry and smile? What was he supposed to do?

_How did Zane get so strong? _Procrastinating having to answer how to behave, Kai suddenly realized that though Zane had been tough, he had never been physically capable of, well, shoving one of his friends by the chest and making him fly four feet back. Sure, he could pack a punch, but—this was overdoing it.

And to think, Zane didn't even know that Kai was deaf or blind in one ear. Continue this, and he might completely lose all ties to the real world.

"I hope I did not injure you," Zane continued, crawling into vision by the corner of Kai's good eye, which lay fixed over the boards decorating the ceiling. Zane didn't look quite the same as he had been when Kai left him at the cemetery five years ago, nor at the wedding. His hair was the biggest change that he could see from down here on the floor, trying to chase his stilted breathing that wanted to, automatically, spit euphemisms at Zane for being so rough with him, despite the fact that he _knew _he deserved it after the draconian welcome. The Zane that Kai had only ever known had a buzz cut that he pulled off with a cheesy, dorky smile. The Zane now had longer hair that fell over his forehead, tousled at the nape of his neck, pin-straight and lightly-colored like bleach. When he moved, so did his locks, whisping in small clumps over the sides of his face, like a forevermore wind was gently ruffling them every time he moved out of a statue's locus. And it seemed like Zane's face had, for the first time since Kai had evermet him, _aged_. He did not look like a little kid anymore. He didn't give off the curious, childlike manner that before had made people want to wave their hand at him, laughing off anything he said. He gave off a more mature, _I-know-what-I'm-doing-now _soundwave that startled Kai just as much as his strength. _I really missed a lot, _he thought. _I missed you aging, growing up, letting go of your inner kid…I can feel that you're not the way you used to be anymore. You're different. _

_What else could I have missed? _

Zane reached out a hand, wrapping Kai's around it and helping him into a painful sitting position. At a loss for words, Kai did nothing but move with the pull taking him up, now regretting not thinking of what he was supposed to say. It was no easy question. How do you answer to this? What do you do? Hug him? Would that be weird? _I'm happy to see you, but it's been so long that I feel like I'm not welcome enough to do that. Besides, if you knew…what's become of me…_Kai's throat tightened. _I can't tell you what's wrong with me. I can't. It'll either make you pity me, cry, or something like that. Even if you're grown up now, I can't tell you. _He propped himself by the hands, staring at Zane through a haze that did not release him from its heavy, clinging fog, wrapping its tendrils around his limbs and narrowing his chances of escape or self-willed movement. He stared into Zane's pale blue eyes, looking for whatever he could find. Some answer. He leaned back as Zane, sitting on his knees with his hands on them, stared at him without showing anything he might've dropped hint to so many years ago, deepening the change that he'd undergone since Kai had seen him.

And then, Zane smiled. It was the goofy smile that was so big it looked like his face would pop off any second now, hiding his teeth behind his lips, brightened his cheeks and lighting his eyes like a Christmas tree through a window. _You look so old, _Kai thought, feeling his tense body drop a decimal of his arrested muscles, _but you still smile life a goofball. _

_I can't believe I didn't realize…How much I _missed _you._

"Brother!" Zane breathed, exhaling relief, and leaning forward, he wrapped both arms around Kai's, pinning them against his body, but crushing him to his chest. Zane's chin rested on Kai's relaxing shoulder. His hug, this time, was tight—Kai was at moment stung by surprise, but glad that no matter the distance of time separating them, Zane would always be the classic one who loved hugs more than cooking. Kai's heart pounded. He had yet to wrap his head sensibly around the idea that _Zane _was _here. _In _Four Weapons, _hugging him. The real question was _why, _but he'd save that for later. Kai picked up his hands from the dirty floor and wrapped them around Zane's small body lacking second thought, taking in the solid feel of his friend being held to him, laughing into his ear like the old friends they were. Kai didn't think, ever, that he'd be holding Zane so soon, didn't think he'd have the strength in him to even look into his face without remorse. He surprised himself by being the one to ask to hold onto him just a little while longer. _I've put myself through constant training to rid myself of all this. I made myself grow immune to thoughts of ninjas, of my friends, and to the pain that those thoughts bring. I've trained myself to stop hurting so much. But I never thought I'd trained myself enough to be able to face them—and without breaking apart right in front of them. Here I am…and I'm not broken down. Maybe it's because I'm still processing it…_

Kai just held on tighter to Zane. _I guess you were finally done with me avoiding your guys' phone calls, huh? _He laughed into Zane's shoulder, taken aback by the feel of hard muscle underneath the material of his shirt. More than meets the eye must've changed…

"Kai? Is everything okay? I heard crashing—Kai?"

He had almost completely forgotten his wife in his struggle to in-claim his own relief, the relief engaged to the sight of Zane, who did not come with any strings attached to being right here, right now. He almost didn't hear her because she was on his left side where the deaf ear embargoed him, but what gave away her sudden company to the room was the perk of Zane's head away from Kai's body, insinuating that he was taken by something else. He partitioned from his long-missed friend to tilt back his head, twisting it so that his right ear could pick up on anything said, while watching his wife come into view from around the table he'd knocked his head on. The margins of his eye saw Zane lean back, queerly looking up at her with his hands pawed on his knees again. He pursed his lips.

Anya's eyes looked blown when she saw Kai lying on the floor with Zane. _I'm totally sending the wrong message. _He scrambled to his feet, as if that made nothing more suspicious than what she'd already caught him doing—not that he was doing anything—to sweep his arm around her waist and proudly bring her closer to Zane. Zane was more elegant in finding his feet, less dizzy than Kai, who'd taken two hits impossibly to the floor in a matter of time. He dusted off his hands.

Anya looked up at Kai through skeptical eyes, looking a little peeved. "What's this?" she asked, sounding like the defeatist she could sinlessly change into when she happened to fall over something she wasn't so pertinacious about. That was what Kai could continue to fall in love with: Her struck magnetism.

So early did he not believe he'd be bringing face to face an old friend that he'd vented to Anya about over and over again since they met with the wife he adored. Zane piqued with the honorable ardor that defined him. Eyes lighting up, Zane shook his hair out of his eyes, stretching out his hand to Anya like there was _not _a huge secret sitting between them, the enigma that involved wedding bells in which Zane was never invited to hear. Kai had always been a nervous wreck about the day he'd have to face his friends, having to spit the truth that he was married eventually thereafter; it would never be easy saying that your four old best friends weren't invited to one of the greatest days of your life. He knew they'd be upset.

But facing Zane now, he didn't feel ambivalent to the idea. In fact, he felt _eager _to introduce the love of his life to Zane. He was proud of Anya, proud to be her husband—why not show off that he was happy?

Kai's face twisted into a smile. He brought Anya a step closer to Zane, arm around her, so she could meet his form of first greeting. She was hesitant to lift up her own hand and shake his, especially since Kai hadn't told her who he was or what they'd been doing on the floor yet. "Zane," he said pompously, seeing Anya's contentious look in remark to the name that she remembered hearing more than once over the years. Her head snapped back towards Zane with a frown. Zane continued to, in a way that sometimes freaked people out, smile. Kai watched them shake hands with awkward vibes coming from Anya's end and friendly from Zane's. "This is my wife, Anya."

Zane's eyes snapped towards his. "Wife?" he asked, startled. _I knew that would be coming, _Kai intoned inwardly. He held his breath. _But so far, so good. You're not trying to kill me yet; that might be a good sign. _

"…Yeah." He kept his arm steady around Anya, who had the same frown on her face. "Anya, this is my old friend from the past, Zane." He didn't have to specify which part of his past he meant. She was already aware.

"How do you do." She sounded bizarre. Not quite understanding yet. Okay…

Zane stared at her. "I didn't know you had a wife. Do the others know?" His eyes did not slip from Anya to Kai, rather taking in the looks of her right there, sizing up what he hadn't been able to see. Kai's guilt ebbed in his stomach. Or intestines. Somewhere down there it was aching, and he didn't like the butterflies doing the tango in his stomach.

"Not…really."

Zane's face was unreadable. _What's he thinking? Is he mad? _Kai's breath stayed in his lungs, stuck there with agog filling him up as if he were being stuffed as a trophy to place on a man's mantle of his greatest kill. He couldn't tell, couldn't see what Zane was thinking. His face was illegible.

Zane's voice was quieter than the last it had been the final day Kai saw him five years ago. He felt his stomach get even tenser. "How come you didn't tell me?" he whispered, finally taking his eyes off Anya. He continued to remain moribund of some sign of what he was thinking, light irises chastised by their own flat feature, boring into Kai's face with such uncomfort that his face lit to flames under his skin. He felt Anya's eyes on him too.

"I wasn't…ready."

"Ready or not, you can't just _hide _this from us!" Zane exploded. He didn't yell, but his calm voice raised to beyond hysterical. Kai flinched. Now, he could see everything Zane was thinking as it careened his face through all his hidden thoughts: _How could you do this to me? Why would you? We were friends; I would've told YOU! How could you? What's the matter with you? This is outrageous; what were you THINKING? _Kai jerked slightly with every different thing he noticed switched over on Zane's face. He suddenly lost his confidence. "We are your _brothers! _You cannot simply get married without _telling _us that you've done so; we would've liked to know that you are in a relationship so serious! I do not even know how long you've been married, but whatever amount of time it still feeds my disappointment in you!" Zane's scornful look told Kai that this wasn't going to get better. Hurt, betrayal, and anger made his two white hands curl into fists at his sides, hardening just as his icy eyes did. A trickle of light blue danced under his skin in the design of his veins. _The Ice inside of him. _"And did you ever stop to think that perhaps _we _would've enjoyed being a part of your life, too? It's quite hilarious how you let a woman into your life like this while you push us away every time we tried with you; you pushed us and pushed us and demanded that we stay out of your life, while you are doing exactly the thing we would've wanted to _know _about?! It would've been nice if you checked in with us every once in a while, even gave us a _heads up _about yourself, saying something around the venue of 'I am okay' or even, hey, 'I AM IN A RELATIONSHIP!'" Zane yelled loudly. Kai felt the power of his words slap him in the face. His friend's anger was explosive in a way that was so uncharacteristic of Zane, who normally _never ever ever _got mad like this over _anything. _His face was pale, icy cold in pure anger. Betrayal swathed his mask. "How can you not inform us of this?! You _know _how much we love you, supported you as you healed yourself from all this—we gave you _time, _we left you voicemails that let you know that _we _were okay so that we may empower you to know that it IS possible to get better—we still believed you were _hurting, _that you were having a _hard time _healing, that you were struggling to move on, but NOOOOO! YOU WERE ACTUALLY GETTING MARRIED BEHIND OUR BACKS AND COMPLETELY IGNORING US WHILE YOU HAD A CLANDESTINE LOVE LIFE! YOU WERE HEALED! PERFECTLY FINE! AND YOU _DIDN'T EVEN TELL US YOU WERE OKAY!_WE WORRIED OVER YOU CONSTANTLY, TRIED TO HELP YOU, LEFT YOU _BIRTHDAY GIFTS _AND HOME-COOKED MEALS AND LETTERS ON YOUR PORCH, HOPING TO GET THROUGH TO YOU, AND THIS _WHOLE TIME _YOU WERE ACTUALLY MOVING ON WITH YOUR LIFE?!YOU DIDN'T EVEN HAVE THE GUTS TO _SAY TO OUR FACES THAT __**YOU NO LONGER WANTED US ANYMORE!" **_

The last part was a shriek. Zane never yelled, but suddenly, the whole shop was filled with his scream. It captured in the cauldron, danced off the metal, filled the samurai helmets with a face of rage, was sucked into the walls and vomited back out by the insulation. He was panting, body heaving with the anger that he was feeling. Tears were threatening to spill out of his eyes. When he blinked they became true.

Kai felt so ashamed. _He's right, _he thought, shaking so hard that Anya brooded her arm around him to keep him on his feet. _This is what I expected, but I didn't want it to happen like this. I didn't want this to happen this way. _He bent his head, wishing he could melt into the floor forever.

"Hey," Anya said, her own tone hard. She scolded. "Don't freak out on him like that. He doesn't deserve you flipping out on him for showing you how happy he is."

"You're right," Zane snapped. Kai glanced up quickly. His body was rigid, a statue, face leaking tears, looking like he was disgusted with the sight of Kai. _What have I done? I didn't know that my actions would turn into something so horrible. I didn't think it would turn out like this. _Zane's tears dropped off his face, and he stared at Kai so hard that he felt like a bug pinned to a plate under a microscope. His voice crackled. "He _doesn't _deserve me _or _my friendship."

He turned on his heel and stomped for the exit.

_No, _Kai's desperate leap for him, reaching out his hand from this far away, grabbing at Zane's collar through his line of vision but actually not being close enough to touch him. Zane continued to walk. "Zane, _wait—"_

Then, there was a loud wail.

Kai froze, for a second thinking that Zane was making that noise—but by the way his friend stopped dead in his tracks said it wasn't. Kai located the source of the sound coming from over his shoulder. He looked backwards where the sound was torching from, and he felt his heart plunge down to his feet.

Anya had left the door to their house, connected to the shop, swinging wide open in her worry to come out and find out what happened to Kai after the serious of thuds and crashing. And the scream was coming from a lonely Alex, somewhere inside the house, screaming her fool head off as she cried for her mother.

Kai's eyes swapped back to Zane. Pleading with his eyes. Zane, hips twisted so that he could stare back at Kai, had his lip slightly curled in duplicity. His eyes continued to stream tears down his cheeks, nostrils quivering in cry. He _knew _what that crying was. It was the wail of a baby, and Zane knew that wail very well. His face said, _I can't believe you would DO this to me, after everything I have done for you. _Kai knew what shame he should be put to, for that was exactly what he should be charged with. He made out to be ungrateful for all they have done for him_._ Kai's guilt was a virus, taking him down like the influenza that killed his mother. Zane shook his head at him. Then, breaking the tension for a split second, he sneezed. He rubbed his nose crisply, shooting darts out his eyes, shaking his head again. "And the sick thing is," he said, "you could _live _with doing that to us."

And he turned around and walked away.

"Zane!" Kai called, beseeching him, but Zane continued to walk. _Do I go after him? _He thought, reaching out his hand, hearing Alex wailing in the background. Zane walked away from the path. His figure was gone. _Do I go? Do I chase him? But what do I say? Do I let him mull over this and call him later?_

In the end, Kai let him go.

He'd call him later. He had his number, waiting to be used… Kai opened up shop dreary and forlorn, wishing that he could crawl into bed and forget all this. Anya came to check on him thirty minutes later, at which point he'd only served 2 customers looking for custom-made weapons and worthy tools for harvest. She wandered out of the house, pulled him into a hug, and let him hold her for support, as he had done all the years he'd lived in love with her…secretly.

"He'll forgive you," she whispered in his ear. "He needs time to think about it."

"I don't know about that," Kai croaked. He cleaved to her.

Anya, arms wrapped around his neck, pulled back, softly lying a hand on his cheek so that she could give him the tender smile that was only for him (and for Alex), that he won when he asked her to marry him. She was his, and though he felt bad for keeping secret of this affair from his brothers, Kai did not regret falling in love with her—_or _marrying her as his wife. He handled this unprofessionally. He needed to give Zane time to think. No doubt he'd spread the word to the others about what he learned, that Kai was married _and _a father, and the others would be just as mad, but selfishly that would take the burden off of Kai and allow him to explain himself in any way that wouldn't make him sound like an ass.

Anya stood on her toes to kiss him. "I love you," she said. "Don't worry about this; you'll figure it out. You're strong enough, Kai, to know why you never told them, why you wanted to keep it from them. You don't need to feel ridden by guilt to where you lose all your nickels about it. If they really love you, they'll understand. Just give them time." She smiled wisely. _Anya, _he thought, pulling her lips to his, _always knowing what to say. _He wrapped his hands around her cheeks, deepening their kiss, hoping to stay heady in her distraction forever so he'd never have to face this…

"What kind of customer service is _this? _I walk up and the first thing I see is you gnacking off my sister's face, you asshole. That earns you four extra bullets in your forehead when I'm done with you."

Kai broke away from Anya immediately. Standing in the doorway of his shop was a dark haired man, in his late twenties, with a mop of unruly dark hair mussed over his scalp. His skin was tanned—a surfer's tan, no doubt—down to the collar of his black shirt, hidden under a black jacket and ripped, torn up jeans, down to the dirty shoes on his feet. In his hands, he was holding a pair of completely black sunglasses that were taken off, showing out his starch black eyes, jet in anger. His mouth was curled into an ornery sneer. Out for blood, his lazy posture screamed _murder him with your hands, _his whole body showing off a large amount of power over others and total control over situations around him, inflated by an ego that would never drown. He flexed his fingers in the air, and through the movement, Kai saw scars up the sleeves of his jacket. Many, many, many scars.

He already had a sinking feeling he knew who this was.

Kai pushed Anya behind him, trying to protect her from this guy, but she moved around him, already angry at what she saw. "Get the hell out of here!" she yelled, her voice hinting that she was scared. Kai grabbed onto her wrist. The eyes of the man flexed, his lips curling into a cocky smile detestably towards her words while he clipped his sunglasses onto the collar of his shirt. He grinned lazily at her after his cocky flirt disappeared.

"That's no way to say hello, dear sister," he said. His voice was smooth, lower, but came out of his mouth like musical notes. He sounded like a man who seduced people more than one time per day. Kai didn't like him off the bat, grabbing Anya without letting her jump out this time while he put her behind him, then crossed his arms over his chest so he could glare out at the man that Anya had feared over yesterday morning. _You're not laying a hand on her, _he thought. His face twisted, lip half-curling downward so his eyes could narrow, brows furrow.

The man looked at him, feigning to be boredly entertained by Kai's attempt to protect his wife. He tilted a head to the side and flicked his tongue out his lips, snake-like, over his lips, ready for spilled blood. _He's going to cause trouble, _Kai thought. What a wonderful day. _He's going to try to hurt us. _"Anya," Kai commanded, "get inside. _Now."_

"Kai—"

"_Now. _Go to Alex, Anya." He wasn't asking anymore. His command made the soft hand on his shoulder slip down.

The man's eyes fell on her, watching her retreat like an ordered puppy. He watched her, smirking fittedly. "Yes, dear sister; run away so that you won't have to watch me slaughter your filthy husband."

"If you _dare _lay _one hand on him—" _Anya snapped from the doorway.

"What will you do? Bite me?" The man laughed.

"Hey, Sassafrass," Kai snarled, dragging the attention off Anya so she would, hopefully, go inside and call the police, letting them deal with this. The man cocked an eyebrow. "Why don't you leave her alone and pick on someone your own size, huh, shorty?"

The man tried to cover up his tweeze at the jab of his height with a frown. "Are we really going to say that? Are you in _any _position to be threatening me?" His shoes made slow, anticipated, purposeful steps along the floorboards, threading his way around the table in the middle of the shop towards Kai, who stood towards the tail end of it. He didn't show anything on his face but determination. The man reached into his pocket, fumbling for something without the jerky movements of one who was _fumbling. _His shoes made _heel-toe _thuds to the floor. He looked tempted with hatred. Kai clenched his fits.

"You have _no idea _what I'm capable of," he said lowly, feeling his hands begin to get warm. The man pulled out of his pocket a hand-knife. That was when Kai pulled out his hands and showed to this threatening bastard the flame that danced over his palms, nailed together his fingertips with their fluid trickle of pure fire, hoping for a fearful reaction out of the man that would put off any kind of fight long enough for the police to arrive. Assuming Anya called them, which knowing her brains, she did. Kai clenched his teeth. _So not my day, _he thought. He spat out, "_Jeremy." _

"I will carve my name into your _corpse," _snarled Anya's brother. "You will be forever marked with my title—the title of who _killed _you."

_Okay…Maybe words won't procrastinate how he's coming towards me…_ Kai felt sweat gather on his forehead. He prepared for battle, fiery hands shaken. He only had a few things to say to this dick, and he wasn't real keen on wasting his breath for him, but the words needed to be said, otherwise this wouldn't start right. "_Bring it."_

* * *

**So...there it is. It's not as good as candy, but it's something, right? xD**

**Go have an AWESOME, spooky day/night! xD**


	15. 14: We Are Worlds Apart

**IMPORTANT! READ PLZ!  
I have a new poll on my page that I'd appreciate if you guys voted on—if you don't have a fanfiction account or are reading this via a smartphone or mp3 device that doesn't show polls, please leave a review stating your vote. The question is: "We now know that Yuki Akamatsu has already filled the sixth spot in the Ninja's Crusade. Now it's only a matter of time: Who will fill the seventh? (You may vote for 2!)" The options to choose from are:  
Seiko, Damon, Jeriminé, Eloquim, Bokuyo, the mailman, Rikku, Kyon/Kaos, Noel, or some character you have not met yet.**

**Please vote, whether it's in the poll or in a review, and remember that you can pick 2 people! I appreciate it! Thanks so much!**

**-Kairi**

* * *

_14. We Are Worlds Apart_

Cole was numb.

It was a tingly type of numb that he had never felt before. A numbness that was sort of misplaced, belonging to some other noun-prepositional-thing—he was never good with grammatical terms—rather than being given up on and just called plain "numb." His whole body sited him with trepidation pooling at his feet, coming off him in the form of condensation that was not exactly _sweat. _Cole wasn't feeling _sad, _really, but trying to figure out what his next move was. His hands clutched at the steering wheel as if the weight of what he had stuffed in the trunk of his car was dragging the frame's ass on the pavement under his balled tires. He didn't really know _what _he was supposed to do, other than turn the keys to his mind over to the auto-pilot department in his head. There wasn't really an answer on Google that could tell him what you're supposed to do after you find a slaughterhouse feast entailing robot body parts waiting for you, especially one that held a beloved friend in the last moments of its shambles. Since finding Sensei Wu ripped in half at his vomit's disposal, Cole had gotten himself to calm down so he could _rationally _think about this, finding the points that were more calming and reassuring to focus on over the bad. _Okay, _he had told himself, _just think about it: Wu is a robot, and if you get both parts of him, you can bring him to ElectroTech and have Jay look at him. Jay would know what to do—if not, his dad would. Hell, they BOTH would. Sensei isn't gone forever. He's fixable._

After telling himself this, Cole no longer felt despair, though he felt bad for not picking up the phone when Zane called, ignoring both the vibration _and _the nagging feeling in his stomach until his class was over when what he really should've done was answer the phone against rules. Think of how differently the outcome of this could've been if Cole had been responsible enough to answer the phone…

_Quit blaming yourself, _he snapped, attention catching the road ahead of him. Cole eased on the brake as he neared a stop sign. He was, conditionally, alone in the car, except for the deadweight veering back into Cole's thoughts every time he turned them away from the idea of Sensei's two-piece holding down the fort in the trunk. This was something he had not argued about when Yuki suggested that they take separate cars, allowing them to take Cole's car away _and _have a vehicle that could be of use when it came to weapon or safety uses. Plus, the car that Yuki specified he'd be borrowing from the monastery garage was one that came with a _charger, _which he'd need if he was going to continue functioning every 18 hours. And if they were going to get Wu and Rikku, riding horizontally in the back seat of Cole's small car, back to full functionality, they'd need some form of replenishment until they could figure out if it was safe to use the monastery or not.

Cole had dug through the robot remains until he'd found the missing lower half to Sensei's body, and had even made 2 trips with Yuki up and down those hundred stairs so that they may carry the people they'd be taking with them. Encouragement to know that the friends they transported were not really dead forever helped Cole keep the energy to make the four back-and-forths to the cars.

He still had no idea what to think.

Yuki had told him that he'd dropped Zane off at _Four Weapons. _That place was the first stop he'd wanted to make before he made it to ElectroTech—he'd already called and told Jay, after leaving he and his wife screaming for him on the phone, that he'd be bringing something big in need of attention, but didn't have the heart to explain to him everything over the phone. That would be cruel of him. But before Cole could suggest that he pick up Zane, Yuki told him that _he'd _be the one to snag Zane off of _Four Weapons's _property line, maybe stealing Kai too, and bring him to ElectroTech, as long as Wu and Rikku were given immediate, appropriate care. Cole had wanted to argue, but he could see it would be no use by the way Yuki's face had set.

The exotic vampire noticed a severe change in Yuki that had not been there before. It was some sort of…alteration of his attitude, something along those lines… Of course, he knew that if _he _were Yuki, he wouldn't expect himself to remain stable to his feelings after seeing what had become of his robot friends. In fact, if anything, he knew he'd shut down, let go, become nothing but a body without a mind. Cole knew that, by experience, you lost yourself when you lost people you loved. You didn't have _you_ to your name anymore. So he wasn't judging Yuki by being a little futile and becoming eristic when he lingered around the corner of the doorway, listening to others argue about him like you saw in movies when parents obsessed their arguments over their changing children. Things had to be different for him. After all—well, Cole had never particularly been _close _to him; he really only knew him as a droid that lived with the rest of them in a cluster, one he saw more than once in his visits to the monastery unlike the other ones—he may or may not know what loss already feels like. He dealt with it in his own way. That's how people were, really.

The only way that Cole really _knew _Yuki, come to think of it, was when he watched Yuki shatter and crack the day that, five years ago, he'd bent over the bed in the infirmary, watching Bokuyo the First Edition die. He'd crumbled. Cole had seen people break before, but he'd never seen, not once, someone _crumble _so definitively to the word; it was the only word in the Webster dictionary and all the others in this world that could describe what he saw in the healer that day. Yuki had been _desperate _to try and revive the boy, to fix him from his poison. But the truth was, the one that chagrined Cole so acutely, that Yuki had _tried so hard _in a way that he had never, _ever _seen any of his friends try before. He'd known, the second that he saw Yuki crumble, what real love was and what real coronary disruption was all about. He'd watch Yuki's heart—even if he might not have had one—be ruined. He had no idea that the healer and the little boy were so close, but that was something of another tale to the way that Yuki _tried so hard _to get him back. What hurt Cole by seeing that was really not emotional attachment to either of them, but to the fact that he realized: _Neither I or anyone else in my team, my team who has suffered so tremendously, has done what he did today. Nobody tried like that. That's what you're SUPPOSED to do when someone you love dies; and we never did one damned thing _close _to this._

He felt pretty shitty after that.

Cole couldn't even begin to decode Yuki without the backstory, history, and connection that it required. He'd never be able to diagnose his problems with the barely-acquaintances relationship they had. He supposed he had no right to judge him at all, with all things considered. He didn't know him beyond what he'd heard from other people—other people that was primarily Zane, and his little sister, Seiko.

As far as Cole knew, Yuki was bashfully frenzied to hear that Bokuyo had returned to the living in Seiko's arms. Seiko relayed that Yuki was a big part of Boku's life, even though nobody gave him any credit for it. When Bokuyo was young, Seiko said that Yuki liked to play with him all the time, carrying him around on his back, allowing himself into the imaginary world that Bokuyo kicked his feet excitedly in with the kid's invitation. Even when Seiko moved out of the monastery, she said that Yuki _remained _in Boku's life, being invited over whenever he felt like it, or when Bokuyo wanted to play while Lloyd was working or Seiko was busy or both of those things. As an older child capable of more worldly understanding now, Bokuyo adored Yuki, and often asked for him to come over all the time. Seiko said that Yuki "practically had his own freakin' house key to her apartment with the time that he spent with her son." And Cole believed that Seiko liked that Bokuyo was so close with the healer; she always said how great Yuki was at entertaining him, at being his friend, at being _there _for him—and not _just _him, Cole believed, but Seiko, too. He figured that with Yuki's kind offers for help, he was a connection for her too in a way that was stabilizing for her emotional roller coaster in need of some park upkeep. She was a lucky girl to have many people to lean on. She had her brother, her roommate, Zane (Cole had no idea if she'd call him a "friend" or not) and her son's playmate, plus whatever friends she had in the real world.

Even though Cole wasn't close to him, he thought of Yuki as someone important. He made Boku happy, which _kind of _made Seiko happy, which meant Cole had to be happy, too. Not only that, but he'd helped them in the past with no incentive whatsoever. He was a laid-back kind of guy.

Not to play matchmaker or anything, but Seiko needed a guy like him in her life.

By this time, Cole was relaxed enough to be thinking about Seiko and Yuki while making the drive to Jay's house without really needing his mind; he was so familiar with this drive that he didn't even need to have his eyes open, though he'd probably get pulled over if he tried. _See? _He reminded himself, finding the two-story blue house perched just down the street with the sign _ELECTROTECH REPAIRS _blaring in a sign off his driveway. _You're okay. Everything will be fine. This is a fixable situation. No need to freak out anymore; Rikku and Sensei will live once more. I just wish I'd told Jay to call his dad before I got here…_

_…_

Nya was changing Onyx's diaper when she saw, out the nursery window, the sight of Cole's sleek car pulling into their driveway. She was too far away to see his face, but already she felt a sick pit welling in her stomach, the sounds of his cries still echoing in her head from the disconnected phone call they'd had earlier. She already knew enough about what was going on because he had called Jay saying that he'd be heading over with something important—an _unspecified _important that he'd alleged couldn't be discussed through a speaker to get the same effect—that was an emergency. Nya had already picked up on the idea that it was the disfigured Sensei, figuring by what had been talked about earlier.

That motherly worry that she only strengthened herself with several children later made her feel queasy. Queasy with the idea that something bad had happened. Bad things were never her specialty, from being kidnapped to extreme devastation, when she wasn't really the type of girl born with the instinctive coping dexterity it took to face the bad world inside of this one. Nya had learned to grow with the things she had been through, but revisiting killer flames was never on her list of great memory-revisits.

She pulled Onyx's pants on over his legs, hearing his baby babble warm her ears. He looked at her with his dark eyes that asked her, _What's wrong, Mommy? _Nya sighed and wished that she could somehow answer him while keeping the truth out of his little beating heart, loving him too much to want to ever burden him with what this cruel world could offer, and picked him up into her arms, kissing him lightly on the cheek. She loved Onyx as much as she loved _all _of her babies; he was the one who was babied the most, because he was Nya's littlest and seemed to really have a depth with her that she couldn't get with any of her other kids. Maybe she was reading too deep into it or something. She brought him tighter to her body, sensing the way his babble turned from casual to suddenly concerned, and carried him out of the nursery. Her feet felt like lead.

Onyx gave a mumble, wrapping his arms around her neck, taking the opportunity to hide his face under her chin. Nya loved this part of motherhood the most, holding them near and dear to you, keeping them where you _knew _they'd be safe: Your arms. Every one of her children, from troublemaker Rie to creamy Noah to moody Natille, would always tuck their faces into her neck, trying to shield themselves from the outer world. Gladly, Nya would _keep _them there. She loved her babies. She loved _having _babies. She loved that Jay didn't _mind _having babies. She loved, ultimately, being a mother. It was the greatest gift the world could give.

Nya's stomach whirled. Like every day since last week, Nya had felt really queasy, vomiting all the time, but not really so sick that she couldn't live outside of it. She'd craved peaches like they were the last thing in the world she could ever have for the rest of her life. She felt, often times, fatigued, shorn off to the point of crying one second and ripping up her flower garden in frustration the next.

Nya had been a mother enough to know what it meant to have these feelings.

She didn't want to tell Jay just yet about the little plus sign on the test she'd taken yesterday. She didn't know what he'd say; he never complained about having kids—Jay was the most child-oriented man she'd _ever _met—or having to deal with them, never whined about getting up late in the night to take care of the screaming child in his arms. He was the perfect husband. The perfect other half of her. The perfect _everything. _And she loved him so, so much.

She didn't know why she was so scared of letting him know that she was pregnant again. After all, Jay was not going to argue with her about it.

Was it the fact that something bad had happened, so now Nya was reliving Rie all over again? Not that having Rie was _bad, _but it was just a difficult, stressful time that she felt contributed to the outcome of her child's weird way of finding the trouble in every object this household had, taking even a _spoon _and turning it into something that she'd have to get yelled at for. Nya was a strong believer that your child turned out the way you were when you were pregnant with them. If you were happy and laid back, your baby would be. If you were stressed out and worried, your baby would be. It was something she had four little examples of. The contributions of their fathers _also _helped. Although it seemed like Cole's laid-back gene either missed Rie totally or got drowned out by Nya's stress…

She came into the kitchen, where she heard the voices of three men that she adored going back and forth with colorful words. She kept Onyx's smart noises close to her ear as she glided into the kitchen in bare feet, her long blue dress swishing at her ankles as she entered, catching the brilliant green eyes of one of the three men that automatically softened at the sight of her. Jay's body relaxed from his seat at the kitchen table, his face turning upward to a smile at her. He gave her that gentle grin that she loved to kiss off his lips whenever she saw it, but knowing she had company, kept the fantasy to herself.

Ed sat next to his son, talking about the loud car in their garage that had been causing Jay to have a migraine. They'd invited Ed over this morning to help his son fix whatever was making that screeching sound that reminded Nya of how a bear would howl if it were hurt, in time before the owner came to pick it up that afternoon. That person had just driven off with his remodeled, secure automobile that had been fixed by the tag-team of the Walker men just before Jay got that call from Cole. Ed's old, weathered body was differenced from Jay's young, plucky outline. Nya looked at both of them for a second before watching Jay turn his attention back to the third man, sitting across from them with poor posture and a bereft look to his face.

"I'm still so sorry for not being able to call you, Zane," said Jay apologetically, looking ruined. "It's just that our phone provider doesn't have the type of service range that goes out as far as the monastery."

Zane had showed up on their doorstep blowsy and woebegone. He claimed he had no idea how he'd managed to find them, just following the way his senses directed him like an inner compass until he'd seen the name of their company sitting at the end of their driveway. He'd told them the whole story about what happened at the monastery, and that was the point where Jay and Nya had felt themselves start at what total _power _and chaos it would take to do what Zane sharply described to a large amount of people _and _objects. They were confined in their own worry about combining that to what they'd heard from Cole. Zane also shared that Yuki had dropped him off at a place Nya hadn't been able to see since she left with Jay on the back of his dragon, Wisp, after he came with her to grab some things so that she could live with him and Kai and the others.

_Four Weapons._

And that's when he told them everything.

That Kai was married. That he had a child—or maybe more. That he seemed perfectly fine without them.

It stung. Nya never knew much to sting like this other than what she'd gone through when she perpetuated boy drama with Cole and Jay at either end of the battle arena, trying to fight over her. When she had lost one, it stung. No longer did that old scar sting, but the same feeling hurt in her chest when she learned that her brother had moved on completely with his life, stringing them along to think that he was still hurting, when really he'd already taken the two steps you face when it comes to starting your _real _life in the world. Kai had been deflecting her for years. To learn that he'd done _this _was just…crippling. Especially to her. He'd been the one to miss her wedding. He'd been the one to ignore her voicemails about being pregnant with she and Jay's first child. He'd been the one to ignore the calls that Jay gave when she was in the hospital, ready to have Noah. He'd been the one who shut them out.

She had always named it that Kai was still healing. He was the hardest hit with all of this; she never judged him for needing time. She'd always believed that five years was a long time to heal, but she would give Kai all the time he needed to get back on his feet.

He already had. That, and more. He didn't _need _them anymore.

_That _was what stung the most.

He didn't _want _them—didn't want _her, _his sister—anymore.

He was done with them.

Nya felt her throat go dry. She came into the kitchen seeing Zane's long straight hair, feeling glad that she got to reconnect with someone she hadn't seen in a while, but knowing what he brought along behind him. She felt crappy inside, not just because of the second heartbeat she was supporting, but because of what her brother had done to her. To _them._

Zane had himself an untouched mug of tea in front of him. He pushed it around, elbow on the table with his cheek in his palm. He didn't express interest in taking in any of the tea, but rather nodding somberly at Jay, understanding that they never could call him with their phone companies being unable to extend calls out there. Jay and Nya had always been so busy that they never thought to go _visit _Zane, but they certainly still loved him and wanted them to be a part of their life. Though now was a bad start to that, Nya was glad that Zane was here so that they all could get back into the loop of being friends that were together again, taking charge of the time that they had lost getting their crap together.

Jay looked hopefully to Zane for an answer. The lighter haired boy gave him a really soft smile. "I am not mad at you, nor do I blame you or hold you to it," he said in all sincerity. "I understand why you did not call. Cole has told me many times that you wished to call me, that you wished to visit, but did not have the time, nor the proper cell phone carrier. He acted as our messenger, but I am still glad that you tried to keep in touch with me." His soft smile returned, though it didn't reach his eyes. Jay looked relieved.

"I missed you, though," he said, patting the table with his palm twice. Onyx cooed in Nya's hair. Jay's face lit up looking at Zane, his old friend, again. "I'm really glad that I get to see you right now, even if it's because of a bad event."

"Ditto." Zane fell quiet.

Nya came closer to them, holding Onyx in her arms, making sure that Zane's attention was grabbed from tracing doodles into the table to finding her eyes before she started talking. She initiated with a grin. "Do you want to hold him?" she asked, bobbing Onyx once in her arms. Zane hadn't formerly been introduced to their children yet—though he said that Cole had already told him all about each of them. Zane's eyes looked at Onyx thoughtfully for a second. Calculating, most likely, what he wanted to do.

Then he said, "Please."

Nya transferred her crowing baby into Zane's arms, who professionally already knew how to hold him with the small head on his elbow and the rest of him supported naturally, but cautiously. Stepping back, she caught smile worth lighting Ninjago City on Jay's face from seeing his friend holding tight to his youngest baby, the one that Jay was closest to, which had to make everything brighten the mood from dingy to hopeful. Zane's sadness rose away when he held Onyx in his arms. "Hello," he said, as normal as could be, like nothing was wrong with anything. "My name is Zane. What's yours?"

Onyx gave a smile and clucked, "Bvvvvvvvv."

"What a lovely name!" Zane took a hand to touch his tiny lips. "You are a very beautiful baby, I think. Yes, you're so cute…You have a pretty face, you know that? Yeah, you do. Do you think _I _look pretty?" Onyx gave a low noise. Nya laughed. _It seems like he understands what Zane is saying._ "No? That's okay. I'll never be as cute as you anyway."

"Oh, well now, I think that one's quite the talker, ya know," Ed input, catching Zane's attention. "I asked him earlier if…"

She hadn't noticed that Jay had stood up until she felt his arms around her waist, taking her out of the kitchen and into a small place where only she and he existed. Every time they touched, she got this dimension-warp feeling. She leaned into him, feeling his chest pressed against her back, feeling his cheek pressed to her hair, taking her own hands and putting them over the arms that were wrapped around her waist. She relaxed into his shape. Jay pushed his mouth against her ear. "Everything okay?" he murmured.

Nya watched Zane and Ed talk without any idea what they were saying; she was bottled up into the world that Jay had pulled her into, trying to stay there for as long as she could without ever leaving it behind. She exhaled. "In truth? Not exactly," she whispered back.

Jay kissed her shoulder. Nya trembled. "I'm sorry," he said back. "I know that with what he told us, it's hard to think that Kai would do that…"

"There has to be a reason for it," Nya said. "There _has _to be. Why would he do that to us if there wasn't a reason?"

"I don't know." Jay kissed her temple, taking a few seconds longer to let his mouth leave. Nya shivered like she always did in his embrace. "We'll figure it out. I promise."

He kissed her on the cheek briskly, then let her go. Nya ached without him. She always would.

…

_~Yang_

I whistled a stupid tune while jingling the keys to my car inside my pocket, leaning against the car door with my back pressed to its very definition. My parents—bless them—are angels who are kind enough to pay for _my _car until I have the way to pay for it myself. I was parked on the corner next to a bakery that had a coffee shop in the back next to a book store, which is a pretty weird combination if you're gonna make a small store, but Artenia is chock-full of those weird creations. I absentmindedly watched the back of my right hand, having a stare-down with the eye-shaped mark across the back of it, the one that I was painted with for some reason that I never understood. I keep reminding myself to ask Sensei Wu about it, but I'm a dork, so I forget it all the time or am too lazy to pick up the phone and call. He'd know. He knows everything. I wouldn't doubt that he had a reason for if sand or dirt came first. I guess that's what happens when you're a sensei or something.

"Gosh, it takes _forever _to actually get to the cash register in there! They should have more than one acne-irritated guy manning the store." I looked up at the sound of the shop's bells tinkling, the kind that only sounds when the door is opened by someone so the shopkeeper knows that customers are arriving. I straightened myself up off the passenger side car door when she stepped out of the dim shop, pushing open the door with her right palm that crossed over her body just to hold it, clutching a white paper bag in her other hand. Her dark hair was pulled into a ponytail that swayed behind her, matching the brown eyeshadow that was skimmed over her bright olive skin. Seloria let the door fall closed at her paced steps away, raising two of her dark eyebrows connected to her flat face at me in humor. "They really need to edit the layout of that shop. Someone could get lost on their way to the end of the line," she said to me, pulling her army-green jacket closer around her body at the light breeze coming from the autumn air. She had on a pair of dark blue skinny jeans with tall leather boots on. Smarter than me, she dressed better for the occasion than I did, in the event that it's colder than normal out here; I guess that just happens when it gets closer to the holidays. You'd think I would've thought about that when I got dressed this morning. I grinned as she walked closer to me, waving her paper bag like it was a trophy from the hell she had to go through to get it, giving me a small-toothed white smile at her winnings. My body warmed as she neared. She'd been the one to insist that she buy some small donuts from the small shop that everyone in Artenia was talking about, since our day out was planned to be both casual and experimental. I really don't know how you can do both of those things, but I wasn't about to argue with her choice of words.

"Which is _exactly _why I didn't go in with you," I said, inviting her closer with my open arms, plucking the bag from her grasp and setting it on the top of my car before she could wave it at me anymore. She looked at me through her scandalous, black-lashed eyes in a surprise at the challenge I proposed (try getting that back without going through _me), _tilting her round head to the side with a smirk. She was famous for standing up to me like that until I cracked in her hands. Which is exactly what I did without even putting up a fight. I know, I'm kind of lame when it comes to her. I leaned towards her, my heart pounding for her warmth to fill me. I always craved her when she was away—and when it was cold out. I planted a small kiss on her lips. It might seem weird to you, reading this and realizing that I just_ kissed a girl and liked it, _but I've changed a lot. Girls aren't as gross to me as they were before, and plus, Selie is my girlfriend of around four years, so I shouldn't really be in danger of getting cooties…If she had them, I'm infected all over.

Taking her hands in mine, I felt at the freezing cold tips of her fingers. I looked down at them to see if they were red—no, just cold, like she had no circulation in them. Selie smiled at me gently when I raised an eyebrow. "They have the AC on in there," she told me, flicking her eyebrows up in a _yeah, I know _type of motion. She looked down at her thin fingers, wrapped in mine, for the little bit of warmth I was trying to channel from myself into her. I wished it worked easier than that. I kneaded them between my fingers and thumbs, working to get the blood warm and the circulation running again; she'd always had cold hands, like she stuck them in ice all the time when she had nothing better to do; she explained to me that she had bad circulation problems that she got from her mom. Her mother's were the same way.

Seloria smiled at me, flipping her bangs off her forehead for a split second. I shook my head. "We should file a complaint," I murmured, leaning closer to her. "Sue them for having their AC on when clearly Mother Nature had the same idea. You could've frozen into a Popsicle." I kissed her again, this time for many more seconds than the last, followed by a series of smaller, longer kisses afterwards. I think I'm probably the worst of both of us when it comes to being publically affectionate, always asking for more than the people around us wanted to see, which would be understandable. I wave off the looks people give us. It's not _that _big a deal; I've seen worse cases of PDA in places that had little kids, whereas this street has nothing but an old guy sitting on a bench twenty feet down the sidewalk.

Seloria's cheeks were rosy when I pulled away. She looked a little disheveled at my kiss. Trying to play it off cool, as always, she leaned into me, pressing me back until I stopped moving. "Well I'd _hate _to cause a fuss over something so minor," she joked with me, shaking her head. I tilted mine.

"A fuss? Baby, I can't have you _freezing_ to death," I said, taking my hands from hers and wrapping my arms around her waist instead, pulling her to me. "I would make all the fuss in the world if something were to happen to you." I sincerely murmured, my breath ruffling the hair around her face. She slipped her hands between the open zipper of my half-open sweatshirt, searching for warmth against my chest, near my beating heart. I could feel her cold hands leaching through my shirt, sullying me with the chill she carried everywhere with her, but embraced the idea of being able to warm her in the process. I flashed my half-smile at her. "I'd do anything for you."

Seloria pressed her face between her hands, falling into me. Her forehead pressed to my shirt. I barely could hear her murmuring to me, muffled by my body. "I love you," she whispered.

"I love you, too," I told her back, holding her tighter.

"I also love car heaters."

I laughed, kissing her hair, letting her go so that she could smile up at me, her face enlightened by nothing but life. _You'd never see that in _Seiko's _face, _I bitterly told myself, reviving the pissed-off irritation I was feeling towards her negative, stubborn attitude. I pushed thoughts of my roommate away so that I could look to Seloria and see nothing but my future. My world. My everything. "Let's get you warmed up, then," I told her, and broke away to open the passenger door for her, chuckling as she snagged her white bag from the top of the car beside me. She playfully stuck out her tongue in my direction. _You'll pay for that later, _I promised silently, shutting the door behind her so that I may wander around the hood of the car, moving my keys in my hands for the ignition when I got inside, plucking open the driver's side door with that _pop _the handle gives just before it creaks open. I slipped inside and let the door come shut behind me.

And all the while, I never even had a clue what was happening on the outside of my all-too-perfect world…

…

"Jeremy! _Stop!" _Anya screamed. Kai faintly heard her yells at her brother from the door, praying to _God _that she'd stay over there and not interfere, knowing that like everything else she'd get hurt if she stepped in. He could see nothing but Jeremy's stone cold eyes, thirsty for his blood, in his line of vision, lunging forward with his knife every single second without pausing to _breathe _or anything _NORMAL _humans needed to do, making Kai jump back and knock things over quicker than his body could hold. He heard the _crash! _of his stack of samurai helmets being involved in Newton's first law of motion when Jeremy took a wide swipe at him, making him dodge and knock them over. Kai didn't want to hurt Jeremy—but it didn't look like he had a choice. _But do I use my fire, or grab what the nearest weapon could be?_

_Are you kidding?! He won't even give you a _second. _There's no way you can grab something without getting stabbed. _Kai had to keep as far away from Anya's side of the shop, so Jeremy wouldn't try to use her as bait or hurt her in any way. That was the first thing that Kai needed to establish. Second was finding out what to do.

_I can't use my fire; I'll set this place in flames. _Curse him for having the layout of this place be dreamed in wood. Kai dodged another swat. _I'm in a shop full of weapons; if I get the chance to grab something, I should be able to find something to fend him off with._

Jeremy grinned, flashing almost pointed teeth. "Oh, come on, Cripple; don't _run, _it'll only make things worse for you!"

Kai gritted his teeth, wishing today would fade into black so he wouldn't have to deal with it anymore. He looked for the nearest weapon, trying to keep his one eye on Jeremy at the same time—

He gasped.

Jeremy cried with laughter. "Ha ha! Gotcha, Scarface!" A line of blood started to ooze off of Kai's arm, dripping quickly onto the floor as the long cut began to materialize. Anya's brother's insane face only grew from there to whole new levels of insanity that no one could've thought possible, his eyes transforming into orbs that were windows to what it really was like inside the head of a psychopath. Glaciers of ice-cold evil traveled over his face. Jeremy took the successful attack as feed for his obsession with Kai's death—for what reason, again?—while coming back quicker and faster for the kill, making Kai almost trip over himself. _What the hell do I do?! _Kai clenched his teeth, trying to block out the pain of the cut on his arm. _Damnit, damnit, _damnit!

"_JEREMY NO! _Just stop this, Jeremy! Leave Kai alone! STOP IT!" Anya wailed. He ignored her cries, taking the knife and lifting it in the air above his left shoulder, the knife held backwards by the hilt, ready to slice it against Kai's skin again. The blacksmith's heart come to terms with how realistically scary this was. He held his breath.

"JEREMY _STOP_!"

_It's not WORKING, Anya, _Kai thought.

And then he tripped.

His body came falling down on the ground, a large crash of things falling on top of him—the things were the boxes of gloves he'd had stacked in the back corner, now releasing their inner holdings from their square cells onto him, blinding him as they fell from nowhere. Kai's anxiety level rocketed. _No! This is his chance; he's going to hit me! _Kai tried to push the boxes and the gloves off of him, at least so he could see where Jeremy was, giving him the chance to move or even fight back, but there were too many. This was it, his moment of weakness that Jeremy had been waiting for, the chance to stab him from blade tip to hilt. Kai tensed for it.

_"No!"_

The movement of something quick came past him. Kai saw it with his good eye, seeing something tall and yellow being raised into the air with the streak of blonde that moved past. Kai scrambled backwards as he heard a loud grunt, a grunt that sounded _angry _at being hit by something. He freed himself of the mountain of gloves.

Anya stood there with the broom in her hand. She had hit Jeremy with it, but now, his vengeful eyes were gleaming with truth of how he _really _felt about his sister. Anya took a couple of steps back as Jeremy straightened himself from the bent position he took on after being crowbarred with a broom.

Kai's footing was skittish, but able to move Anya backwards quick enough so that Jeremy's leap was missed. He spat onto Kai's floor. "Quite the hero, aren't you, Scarface?" He chuckled haughtily, wiping off his chin from the drabble of blood that came off his lip. _Anya hit him in the chest, _Kai thought, _and hard, too. _He took the broom from Anya, moving her back as far from this as she could humanly get with his arm. Jeremy lunged again.

Kai only had time to raise the end of the broom and hit him square in the side of the face with it, knocking him over onto the boxes that had yet to be knocked over. Jeremy made a loud sound when he crashed. Kai saw that in the frenzy, he'd lost hold of the knife, lying from his feet, exactly what Kai used to kick it far, far away. It smacked into the bottom of one of Kai's shelves and bounced off in an angled direction, spinning to a finish. The blade was licked with his blood.

Kai held the broom at Jeremy, using it to pin him without actually touching him with it. Jeremy stared lazily at the end of the cleaning tool like it was nothing but a birthday card from his mother, barely even fazed, having to do with his ego that brought him here in the first place. "Done yet?" Kai asked, wishing he could plunge this down Jeremy's throat and watch him choke to death on the end of it. Jeremy glared at him.

"Not quite," he said, and his hand, which was hidden inside of his jacket pocket unknowingly to Kai—it was on his left, which he couldn't see—ripped out of its cage and into full view. Kai looked down.

He was looking straight into the barrel of a gun.

Shit.

"Drop the broom, Scarface," snapped Jeremy.

_If I do, you'll shoot me. _Kai dropped the broom, against his own inner voice, and held up his hands.

"_Jeremy!" _Anya screamed.

"SHUT UP! Make one move, Anya, and I shoot him right here!" her brother commanded, and quicker than Kai could process, was on his feet, arm outstretched with a small black handgun forcing Kai to the back wall, where his back hit the final thing he was sure he would feel. Sweat beaded on his forehead. _A gun, _he thought. _Even though I've done everything there is to do in horrible situations, I've never looked down the barrel of a gun like that before. _His body stiffened. Jeremy's eyes were bloody, icy. Evil. Kai had a hard time looking at them, knowing what he was seeing there. He instead kept his eye on the gun. He didn't want to see those cruel eyes anymore.

"Jeremy, _stop this. _Why are you doing this to him?!" Anya asked desperately. "STOP IT, Jeremy! Let him go!"

A cruel smile drenched his lips. Jeremy kept it. "Because, little sister," he said, "you can _never _be happy."

The click of the gun cocked. Kai's eye slid from the gun to Anya's face, crying tears, just over Jeremy's shoulder. His hands felt hot. _I have to use the fire, _he thought, knowing he promised he wouldn't use it for anything other than blacksmithing, and knowing full well that this place might catch fire. It was that, or die here in vain. What else could he do? Kai's hands started to burn at the palm.

"_No!"_

Jeremy's teeth flashed. Kai clenched his own in ready. "Here's a late wedding gift, Scarface; I hope you don't mind…"

His finger fell on the trigger. Kai could only hear his heartbeat. He raised his hands to burn everything he was within reach of, starting with Jeremy's body. He only had one shot to do this, one chance for this to work, and he was already running out of time sitting here trying to work it out in his head. Kai's hand lifted into the air in slow motion, ready to shoot fire straight out of his palms. Incinerate this bitch.

And then—

Jeremy started to convulse.

Kai couldn't even act. He froze.

The gun dropped from the palm of a killer's hand to the floor that it was ready to shed blood on, flipping as it bounced after hitting the surface so it could skid away when it finally came to rest. Jeremy's head flipped back, his body spasming like he was having some sort of seizure, limbs flapping, body convulsing—it was the strangest thing to see. Kai could do nothing but stand there and stare at Jeremy's sudden connection with native dance. _What in the hell…?_

The crazy man dropped to the floor in a heap of lifeless leather and black cloth.

Kai stared down at the ground. He heard Anya make a noise of surprise, one that was clogged in her throat painfully. Jeremy's eyes were rolled shut, his mouth hanging open. He looked…out cold. Kai looked up.

And was shocked by what he saw.

The long, silvery hair in a ponytail could not be mistaken.

Yuki Akamatsu was lowering his arm back down to his side when Kai finally looked at him. In his hand was a small, black box, one that Kai recognized immediately as what Zane's robot form had been killed by: a Taser. His mouth opened without knowing quite what to say. He choked, "Yuki?" to a pretty mangled form of the name, but that was just about all he could manage. Why was Yuki, of all people, _here? _At such a convenient time?

Yuki adjusted the sash of his kimono so he could, giving Kai a blank look. He didn't seem to have changed from the last he'd been seen: still had needlepoint pupils, sandy eyes, and his silvery hair that made him recognizable, and that mouth that pretty much just stayed in a line. He blinked once at Kai. "I take it you're trying to thank me," Yuki said. _His voice is still the same, too. _Kai's loss for words allowed him to nod.

"Kai!" Anya cried, rushing over to him and grabbing his hand, stepping him over Jeremy's body so she could clutch him and sob into him. "You're okay!" She squeezed him. Kai wrapped his uninjured arm around her back, burying himself in her shoulder, trying to darken out this whole, messed up fucking day. He wanted to just fall asleep and never have to look at this day again. He felt so weak from everything…

"Your arm is hurt," observed Yuki from behind him, staying on his right side like he somehow _knew _that Kai couldn't hear him from the left, which would've seemed like a more reasonable direction to go when the right was pretty close to the wall. Kai didn't _want _to break away from the comfort of darkness in Anya's shoulder, but she pushed him back anyway.

"I called the police—they will be here soon, so we'll get you medical help—thank you so, so much," she turned to Yuki, her face ruined, but grateful. The light in her eyes made Kai feel like falling asleep. Maybe that was just the severe exhaustion. "I don't know who you are, but we owe you so much—"

Anya didn't know that Kai _knew _Yuki. The robot blankly looked at her, like he was trying to figure out what she was saying to him, speaking some kind of language he was not fluent in. Kai wrapped his hand over his cut. It was starting to hurt now that he wasn't running for his life.

"Anya," he gasped. She looked over at him, ready to help. "Alex…"

"She was napping." _She's okay, then._

"Can you go check?" Kai felt worry for his daughter. What if she was awake, they just didn't hear her crying? Anya was reluctant to go, but he was insistent that she check on his daughter; he prayed that she was okay, even if he wasn't. He needed a second, alone, with Yuki anyway. She finally listened, leaving him behind.

Kai looked at Yuki, waiting for the robot to start, but they only ended up awkwardly staring at each other until Kai finally asked, "What are you doing here?"

Yuki blinked, looking around. "I was _looking _for Zane, but I don't sense him here."

"He left earlier."

Yuki frowned.

"I, uh, I don't know where he is, but Yuki—thank you. I really owe you my life." Kai kept his hand tightly pressed to his wound. He noticed that the robot was staring at it.

"How unsanitary. You'll infect it that way." Yuki shook his head, raising his eyes from the wound to Kai's good one. Blood seeped through his fingers placed over the cut. He didn't want to look at it, or he might pass out. "I have a kit in my vehicle that contains material for sewing stitches."

Kai had forgotten Yuki's profession with healing and medicine. He blushed like it was obvious that he had totally forgotten something so minor. "I, uh, I don't think that's necessary. The police and paramedics will be here soon…I just need to put pressure on it. You'd probably have to make up some stupid lie about why you're sewing my arm shut when they get here, anyway; they'll be asking for identification, for proof that you're legal—"

"So you will go to the hospital then."

"I guess." Why did he feel guilty saying that to Yuki? Was it because he felt bad for turning down a professional for professionals he knew more about, or what? "I wish I could tell you where Zane was—"

Kai looked out at the hand Yuki outstretched to him. In his hand was the Taser. He exchanged looks with the object to the pinpoint pupils to Yuki's face. "You're going to need this, just in case." Yuki said emptily. His nose twitched. "The police will probably want to know a thing or two about it as well."

"You're not staying?" Kai asked, baffled.

"I have a missing person to look for. I do not have time to stay, if I am not going to mend your wound." Yuki's face turned to a grimace. "You are killing me with the way you're holding it."

Kai chuckled shortly. "Thank you, Yuki. I really owe you." He smiled. Pain shot up his arm again, turning it into a wince instead of a thank you.

"I do not think this is the last we will see each other, Kai. You can owe me then."

* * *

**Okay...I know the last part of Kai's section was not as descriptive as I wanted it to be. I lost my ember. Sawee, but I wanted to get this out tonight.**

**So ****_please_**** vote in the poll,**

**and go have an AWESOME day/night!**


	16. 15: The Other Side

_15. The Other Side_

"There's no point in trying, you know."

Reflexively, her hand snapped back, inches away from brushing her fingertips over the soft, baby-like skin of Zane's face, seconds from letting her icy fingers fall on his pale cheek, to feel his warmth as she'd felt what seemed like decades ago. She whirled away from him at the sound of another girl's voice through the void that usually had nothing but her own, drowned out voice that would only commit itself through static white noise. It was lonely, on the Other Side; there was nothing but silence over here, voices unable to be heard through the thick window that separated her and the rest of the world. She could only watch with her nose pressed against the glass, trying to read lips of the living around her, to fill her head with the sound of their voices rather than actually hearing it. She had no ears anymore, which is why it startled her to hear a voice for the first time in over 2 years. Was this it? Was she finally going crazy in here, as she had been waiting to since she woke up on the Other Side, a place that tortured her with watching life happen right before her eyes in a way that wouldn't let her touch, feel, hear, or be a part of anything that happened over there?

No…No, she wasn't crazy. This was real. Besides, dead people_ couldn't _go crazy. She was jostled to see a familiar girl walking towards her, wearing clothes that looked like they had suffered something terrible, with a gaping hole in the stomach of the shirt and the edges singed black, her face and jacket covered in soot. Her hands were red, like the skin had been worn sore. Her pants were dirty. Even her normally glowing blonde hair was dry, untidy, and shabby. The girl looked rugged.

But then again, should she be talking? She didn't look any better.

Though she was somehow relieved and _happy _to see a familiar face that finally could see and hear her, she took a couple steps back as the girl walked forward. Hearing a voice for the first time in a few years was scarier than she thought it would be, like being deaf and suddenly having hearing again, although that would probably be a miracle to the deaf person in question. This felt more like a cruel joke someone was playing on her. Taunting her with sound. It wasn't funny. Nothing was anymore.

"You know you can't touch people." The girl continued. "You can't feel them, you can't hear them, but you can see them. There is no point in trying to touch them, to feel them. You never will be able to." She took a deep breath, and nodded towards Zane, who held a baby in his arms as a distraction for what had just happened. "It's like that for all of us. Everyone who's on the Other Side, I mean. It's quiet. Lonely. You only ever run into another departed soul every once in a while, but that hardly ever happens, and it's hardly ever anyone you know. I guess I got lucky this time." The girl crossed her arms, taking another step forward with her eyes trained on Zane, distantly staring into him with glassy eyes. "Nature, the ultimate overlord over everything that happens, wanted to create a purgatory for people like you and me." The girl's eyes fell on those that belonged to the only other person on this side of the window splitting them from Zane. Jay and Nya moved around their wide kitchen like there weren't two dead souls hovering in the middle of it. "It wants us to pay for the bad things we did in life."

"I guess I'm at the top of the list, then," said the other girl, and croaked at the sound of her own voice. She hadn't talked in so long that talking, she'd expect, would hurt, but this was nothing like that; she spoke as though she had been speaking forever, when she hadn't wanted to talk since she realized she was dead. Her throat didn't ache willingly. "I did some pret-ty bad things." _How can I talk so casually when I'm talking about what put me here, in this nature-bound 'purgatory'? How can I pretend it doesn't bother me like that? _

"There is no supernatural creature that hasn't done wrong." The girl with the blonde hair sighed. "Me included."

"How long will we be here?" She watched Zane's lips move, but no sound come out. He was talking to Jay across the room. Nothing but silence… All she wanted to do was leave. Move on from the Other Side. Would that ever happen?

The blonde girl watched the same scene, her lips pressed thin. "I think it's a matter of serving out our time for the things we've done. Then, when we've paid for all of our sins, it's only about letting go. Slipping away into whatever comes after this. Finding peace." Her voice wore soft, getting quieter as she talked about the Other Side. It wasn't exactly the thing that everyone was okay with talking about; it was like being eleven years old and afraid of saying the '_s' _word, like it was some sort of bad word or something. "I guess only time will tell."

"So we just watch, then, as the people around us go through—through _this." _She waved her arm out to indicate what she'd watch happen at the monastery. What was so frightening about that incident was not the opening credits to the destruction, but rather the grand finale after the only two survivors had escaped. What demons lie under the shallow veil of darkness… She'd stuck around too late to see, and ultimately she'd watched mass murder as the angry beast ruined everything.

And the worst thing was that she _knew who the killer was. _

She just had no way of telling them—of telling Zane—that they were in more danger than ever before.

She could only watch them obliviously converse, never knowing what _real _danger was about to happen, never being able to hear her when she tried to scream the words at them. She was useless. She knew just what the heart of their problem was, and she couldn't even tell them.

The blonde looked over at her. Her eyes were empty of feeling, but deep down in their crystalline blue depths, she saw words that described sympathy. "You know it's coming, too, don't you, Maya?"

Maya Kiko nodded somberly, returning her eyes to the little child in Zane's arms. She'd always wanted a baby; many, many, _many _years ago, so far back that the decades roared past her without documenting their passing, she had been a normal human girl under the name Mitsuko, and had been as innocent as they came. But she'd known enough to want a child of her own, someone to care about, to love better than her parents ever loved her. She'd had the opportunity, too; she'd met a dashing young man who swept her off her feet—in secret, of course; Maya had never been let out of the house by her parents, only doing so when she snuck out in the middle of the night to see what everything on the outside was like—after only a few times seeing him. He was a gentleman, a kind spirit who respected her, didn't hurt her like her father hurt her mother. He was everything she could've asked for. They'd planned to run away together, begin their new family in a different town under different names. Maya so vividly remembered, the night before they destined that they would run away together, being shaky with excitement. Hidden in the shack they both occupied deep in the woods where no one would find them, they planned their exodus for the following night, but determined they wouldn't go home after planning this, rather staying inside the cabin until nightfall came around again. She was so eager for it that she was bouncing off the walls. She wanted the independence the arranged marriage her parents planned for her never would've offered her, and with her lover, it seemed like any dream she had was entirely possible. To entertain herself that night, waiting for the next day to come, she'd decided that she would change her name to "Kiko" for when they moved to a different town, because it meant "be glad" and "rejoicing child." She'd been so happy. And laying on the futon that her lover had managed to steal and bring into their cabin, she had dreamed of her future with him, dreamed of what she could do now that she was free and in love. The world was her canvas. Now she would paint her dream on it.

And then that very night, the same blonde-haired boy she was looking at now, watching him cradle a baby so tenderly it seemed he couldn't hurt a fly, had burst into their cabin, and had taken her lover away, stabbing him in the stomach and fatally wounding him, throwing him onto the back of a horse so one of his henchmen could steal him away. All of Maya's dreams had been taken away from her then. For no reason at all, Zane had emptily stolen her lover away, advising her that she go back to her parents and forget that she ever met the man she loved, for no good thing would come out of it if she told her family about her affair or went looking for her missing other half. She remembered so clearly how he looked at her with ice cold eyes, face twisted into a scowl, looking at her like she was less than his species. In a way, being a human then, she was. She never could match the abilities of the robot Zane was when he took her love away. He had no emotion then; he didn't care who he hurt in the process.

It hurt just thinking about it. Maya snapped her thoughts away from the horrors that came with Zane's face and rather trying to focus on the question that the blonde girl had just asked her. "It wants him badly," Maya said. "Not just him, but all of them. It wants their death. Its power is so strong—I've never felt anything like that before, not with Kyon, not with myself, or any other thing I've ever come across. It's got a nasty temper, and I've seen how bad it wants them to die." She shivered.

The girl nodded. "I have too. It's the Greater Evil, Maya. It's what the prophecy of the Great Battle was talking about as the opponent of the Seven. I can feel how strong it is, and it gets stronger with all the fear it causes; Zane is giving it more than it can swallow right now."

Maya glanced over at her like she had two heads. "I have no idea what you just said, Witch Bitch."

She rolled her glassy blue eyes, trying to operate her words in a way that Maya would understand. Though Maya hated her during her lifetime, she couldn't make herself conjure the hate now, because Danielle Juliens was the first person that Maya had been able to talk to since she stumbled across the spirit of an old man a few years ago that happened to be a soul-sucker. And, luckily enough, Danielle knew what was happening, why Maya was here, and the people that Maya stalked behind the window, so she really couldn't complain. Hatred was shoved to the side at times like this. Because, like Maya, Danielle had died saving someone she loved.

"The prophecy of the Seven states that the Ultimate Spinjitzu Master will fight alongside six other elemental comrades against an Heir of Darkness, or 'the Greater Evil.' The scrolls that foretell this prophecy are written in ancient characters, and the prophecy isn't really public knowledge. These scrolls haven't been seen for over thirty years, but Wu Garmadon had a handwritten copy of the scrolls hidden in his room, and before he died, he looked at them a couple of times over the summer. Both times I was present for the reading, and when he was translating it onto paper in words that others will understand—those ancient characters are really complex; he used simplified characters in translation—I noticed that he confused the character of 'heir' with the character for 'prince.' They're extremely similar, except for dot placement. Anyway, with that being said, Wu was confusing the phrase 'heir of darkness' with _'prince _of darkness,' and if he told any of the ninja about the Great Battle before, he probably accidentally lied to them when he said the Ultimate Spinjitzu Master would be the one to have to take down the 'Prince of Darkness', which was actually the heir of darkness. It's a common mistake, really. I'm sure anyone could make that mistake. And if you think about it, it wouldn't make sense that a prince of darkness would be the opponent for the Seven because both Kai and Noel were qualified as Princes of Darkness, and neither of them had the qualities it takes to be a Greater Evil."

"What does it take to be a Greater Evil, then?" Maya asked. None of this made sense. What was a Seven, anyway? The images of Kai and Noel flashed through her mind, two people Maya barely knew _or _cared about. "Do you have to have dark pointy hair and a bad temper?"

"No," Danielle said patiently. "A Greater Evil feeds off the corruptions of the world. It feeds off of fear and pain, especially the fear and pain _it_ causes." Her face twisted with worry. "And that's why a Greater Evil's favorite snack is nightmares."

"Nightmares."

"Yes. Nightmares are where all the pain and suffering and fear come from, when it's not real time. They're four percent more common than actual tragedy. Nightmares are where it's at, if you're _the _Greater Evil." Danielle visibly shivered, wrapping her arms around the torso that was once place to the bomb she used to kill Kyon—and herself—to protect the people she…_cared _about? Was that it? "I wouldn't doubt it if Kyon knew who this Greater Evil was, which would make sense because of all the illusions that he created just to inflict pain and fear on the ninja. It had to be more valuable coming from them, for sure."

"What if Kyon _is _this Greater Evil?"

"Kyon is dead," Danielle said flatly. "I saw to that. Besides. You saw what it was at the monastery; that creature was the Greater Evil."

"It was scary, but it didn't seem so great to me."

"Are you kidding?" Danielle scoffed. "The power coming off of it was immense. It's like it's been building up its power for so long, waiting for the time it was ready, and now that it's located the Seven—or part of the Seven, anyway—it wants to take out its opponents early."

"What's the Seven?" Maya asked, feeling dumber than a box of rocks.

"The Seven is the group of Seven elemental warriors that has the capability to control abstract pieces of the universe that normal people can't. In this case, when I say 'Seven,' I'm referring to the group that is the _only group _that can fight in the Great Battle, according to the scrolls. They're all that can fight because they're the only ones that have the powers and abilities needed to possibly take out the Greater Evil." Danielle looked over at Jay, who was on his cell phone. Maya hadn't even been paying attention to the silent movie actors in the room anymore. "It's already obvious that each of the ninja occupies a spot in the Seven. They can control elements, which is something far beyond what normal human beings can do."

"Then what about the last two spots?" asked Maya. "Who fills those?"

Danielle chewed her lip. "I don't know," she admitted quietly. "I haven't been able to tell."

Maya stared at Zane. He had passed along the baby to Nya, who had set the child down so that he could crawl across the floor with a pacifier in his mouth. He looked, underneath the grime of what he'd seen this afternoon, angry over something, but Maya had only just gotten here a few minutes before Danielle showed up. The dead were lucky enough only to have to imagine the place they wanted to go, close their eyes, and appear there. Maya had imagined wherever Zane was, and thankfully had ended up here. Before that, she'd been, after bolting from the monastery at the sight of the monster that ruined everything, at Seiko's house, watching her grow upset over a crappy, short, almost angry letter that Lloyd had left her on the kitchen table, telling her he went out with some "friends". (Cough-cough, _girlfriend. _Maya had already checked.) He was obviously mad over their argument this morning. Maya wanted to punch him in the face; sometimes it seemed like he hurt Seiko just by getting mad at her over something, because of the way his temper flared when he got mad. He was a completely different person. Nasty, angry, just plain rude. After following them around behind the window for so many years, Maya had heard his parents talking about his Devourer's venom before, and how Lloyd only seemed effected by it when he got emotional. Still, Maya wanted to punch him in the face when he got mad at Seiko to the point where he said something under his breath and, often times, left the apartment. Ninety nine percent of the time he left and went to his girlfriend's house so he could vent about it to her.

_I'm glad you don't like-like Seiko anymore, _Maya would think every time. _You don't DESERVE her with the way you act, sneaking around behind her back, saying rude things like that to her. You're a pig. _

"So it looks like we just have to sit back and watch as these people are thrown into trouble with the supernatural again," Maya groaned. She'd seen them all get chucked into danger so many times now that it was awkward having to know they'd need to walk back into that after a five-year remission, and she wasn't even able to share the information she now knew with them. They didn't have their trusty Sensei left to guide them, at least not right now. With their lack of knowledge on this, they had absolutely no way they could know what was going to happen next—and the worst part was, Maya had a pretty good feeling she did. She threw up her hands, wishing she could shove Zane in the shoulder—he was closest to her—and scream in his ear until her dead face turned purple. "Nothing we can do, then. They apparently have to get rid of that 'Greater Evil,' which I have no faith in. That thing was—there's no _way _they can take him out. No way. They're _doomed. _It's going to kill them all, and they won't even see it _coming._" Her voice ended on an exasperated note. She slammed her face into her hands, frustrated. Not that she was _close _to them or anything, but being on the Other Side provided people with only very few options for entertainment, and stalking their lives was how she passed time when she wasn't following Seiko or sitting in the infirmary with Yuki, wishing they could feel her hand on their cheek or her arms around their necks.

_Is there anything I can do to help? _Maya wondered. _Is there any WAY I can reach out to them to let them know they're in danger? Can I figure out a way to let them know what's coming for them? What can I DO? I don't want to WATCH them get their butts kicked, but I can't LEAVE them, either! _

Never thought she'd see the day where she willingly would try to HELP people again.

Danielle's face had, by then, become uncomfortable with this. She was chewing on her nails, which couldn't be too good for them. Although, she was dead, so it wouldn't really change anything. Maya bit her tongue in anger. "Well, by the looks of it, the Greater Evil isn't the only problem they have to deal with…" Danielle's eyes shifted towards the windows in the kitchen outlooking the road. Maya frowned.

"What do you mean?" Maya growled.

"There's another danger to Ninjago lurking around the province," Danielle said quietly, looking truly sympathetic now. Maya narrowed her eyes at her. "It's not anywhere near as powerful as the Greater Evil, but it's definitely a force to be reckoned with. Its target isn't actually Ninjago, not yet. This one wants something else first."

"Do you know what it is?" Maya asked. _Do these people catch a break? Why is everyone so focused on taking over Ninjago? _Although she can probably answer that herself, considering Ninjago was home to supernatural phenomena that was only exclusive here, and before you can even think about taking over the world you kind of have to see if you can take over a simple continent first.

Danielle chewed her lip. She was definitely nervous about this one, more so bothered than she was when discussing the Greater Evil that could probably destruct the entire earth if it got out of control. Maya's slitted eyes allotted her only a sliver of vision, but even from that she could tell he words weren't going to come nicely. "It's a very old, very powerful witch. The very first witch this world has ever seen. And she's angry—she wants to get back what was once hers." Maya blinked. That didn't start to sink in until Danielle's sympathetic gaze connected with the words. Her voice lowered. "It's Katherine. My mother."

_Katherine. _Maya was hit with a force the dead shouldn't have been able to feel, rocking her on her feet. _The Katherine that followed me. The Katherine that shadowed me everywhere I went, watched me from afar. The Katherine that obsessed over me for months. The Katherine that I swear would take things from me, my hairbrushes, my dresses, my beautiful hair pins. The Katherine that killed my family._

Danielle's eyes didn't leave hers. "Maya, it's the witch who turned you into the Original Vampire." She reached out and placed a hand on her startled shoulder. "I didn't realize she was here until recently, when I saw her; I don't know how long she's been here. All I know is that she's mad that her greatest triumph with a spell was destroyed: You. And now that you're gone, there's one person that can replace you—one person that Katherine is after. One person who will make it seem like, if she can do the spell again, you never left this earth."

Maya didn't need Danielle to spell it out any more than she already had. A hand flew to her mouth, much the way it had when she saw the Greater Evil rip apart one of the robots with its own two hands. "Oh, my _no," _she groaned, breathing hot air onto her hand. Danielle squeezed her shoulder. "_Seiko." _

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**NEW ANNOUNCEMENT! ALL WHO ARE INTERESTED IN STUFFS, YOU CAN READ IF YOU CHOOSE: xD**

**This chapter actually pretty much opened the doorway to the path to a new NfaN spin-off that I have been thinking about since before Book 5 began. **This is a type of spin-off that I haven't really tried before; I know I've done the "No Way Out" mini-POVs of Seiko, but those are really more for reader enjoyment than overall impact of the NfaN series. Well, this next idea is for the benefit of the NfaN series...and it's not like the prequel that "Dawn of the Nindroids" is (Sorry that i haven't updated that in a while...I'm working on it, I swear, it's just that i haven't been motivated to write it while I'm putting all my work into finishing NfaN, but the new chappie should be up this weekend.)

So this new "spin-off" is pretty much actually what the definition of a spin-off is.** It takes place during Shadowland and ends probably before Shadowland does, because unlike most spin-offs, it does go hand in hand with Book 5. events of the spin-off are mentioned/ do sorta impact Shadowland. okay. Anyway.**

**This S-O is mostly original-character based. **It's about Seiko, Yuki, Noel, and Katherine, plus a few minor characters, like Maya on the Other Side, for instance.** ***This does NOT mean that Seiko, Yuki, and Noel will be absent from Shadowland; they still have to be there, still ARE there and are as important to the plot as they are now, **but this S-O has a behind-the-scenes, this-is-taking-place-while-that-takes-place-in-Sha dowland thing. Like, while you might be reading about Zane and Cole fighting a tree monster in Shadowland, the events of the S-O will be taking place between Seiko, Yuki, Noel, ETC. while that's happening, but not just precisely that. It's hard to explain, but I'm sure you get it. It's like Joey's spin-off from "Friends." It was happening while other stuff in the other character's lives were happening.

I'm doing this because I want to start branching off my writing from NfaN in a little bit original-style before I go ahead and full-fledge it with the original story I started a month ago. And Seiko, Yuki, Noel, etc. belong to me, so I figured instead of indulging myself in writing from their POVs during Shadowland when some of you might not be interested in watching me write out my interest, I'd give them their own story to belong to, where it can completely be them, and people who are interested in them can read about them, so the people who don't won't have to suffer from a lot of chapters about these characters.

**I posted drawings on DeviantArt for this new S-O, that have the sypnosis and backstory stuff in the descriptions of the drawings I posted. If you don't have a DA or havent looked at mine recently, I'll be copying and pasting what is there right here, so you don't have to go search for it on DA **(unless you wanna go look at the pics or something ;-; then I suppose you can go.)** If you do have a DA and have already read about the story's sypnosis, you can skip to the end of this chapter and do whatever it is that you want to do. x3 so thank you for reading, for those who are leaving now or have already left!**

* * *

**Title**: "For Evermore"  
**Backstory:*(basically just a run-down of information that you already kinda know, except for the last coupla paragraphs.) So you don't have to read it if you don't want to. ** _Long before Ninjago was created, a small continent called Rumenea hovered in the midst of the sea, a place where mythical creatures lived among the humans in peace. Snake-like humans colonized with mortals; sworn alliances between humans and monsters protected entire villages, until a disagreement between species broke out, and the land was corrupted by war. Rumenea's world was destroyed when the darkest of the creatures created havoc, a large, volatile dragon who let greed corrupt him. This demon, after ruining what peace was left in Rumenea by massacring entire communities of humans and commanding the monsters of the land to prey upon their flesh to cause fear, fled the continent, after which it sensed a great power just beyond in vintage Japan. The dragon then came upon this power with his greatest greed, finding a young man standing in a field seeming to teach his two young sons how to battle, and set out to take this unknown power from this man; but little did the dragon know that he was the First Spinjitzu Master, and could not be destroyed by the dragon's greed. _

_Though that leads to a different tale, it entrusts the beginning-and the end-of Rumenea's reign. Upon this small, almost nonexistent continent lived the first witch this world has ever seen, the most powerful of them all: Katherine. When Rumenea's continent was finally destroyed completely years later, it was said that there was no one-nothing that survived the destruction. But a time later, a young woman stumbles upon a battlefield in the newest continent of Ninjago that now occupies the space that Rumenea once did. There, she finds dead bodies leaking blood all over the grass that once made this field beautiful, tainted by war and massacre. The bodies here are both human-and mechanical. _

_The woman trips over one body that she did not see. It is a girl, barely twenty, with long black hair, beautiful red lips, and eyelids sunken from death. Blood stains the front of her corset, and the young woman can see that she has been stabbed. Her senses tell her that this girl did not die peacefully. _

_The young woman steals the body, and runs. _

_In her cottage, the woman attempts several magical spells on the body, taking a list of specially gathered ingredients and mixing them, before finally ending her spell with a lasting hymn. And, two days later, the body of the girl wakes up-she is no longer human. This young woman is the witch, a survivor from Rumenea: Katherine. And Katherine's creation is the first ever vampire this world has ever seen, an immortal with no weakness. The young girl's name, says she, once was Mitsuko, but after Katherine reveals to her that she is dead, the woman calls her "Maya." Maya is cursed to roam the earth, forever alone, bloodthirsty, and monsterous. Katherine wishes to redeem Rumenea, her homeland, back into this new replacement continent, Ninjago, by creating demons and creatures that will serve just as they did back at home. But Maya refuses to do as Katherine wishes-so Katherine slaughters her family at knifepoint, right in front of Maya's eyes, and tells her to clean up the mess-with her tongue, therefore completing Maya's transformation into the original vampire. _

_Many years pass of this time. Katherine has seemingly disappeared off the face of the earth, and Maya is still alone. Until she meets a little girl one day after causing havoc on a midnight-snack, a little girl who reminds Maya a lot of herself. She watches the girl grow up, but notices that, strangely, this little girl looks EXACTLY LIKE Maya. This girl, now a young woman, is her doppelganger, Seiko Mitsuhide. Nature's desire to rebel against the wrong that Katherine had done by creating an immortal creature fed its ability to create a doppelganger, or a living, MORTAL human that looks exactly like another existing person. Nature craves balance; it wants there to be a version of the original vampire that COULD die. _

_Reaching an unexpected turn of events, Maya is killed in an attempt to save Seiko from danger by having her heart removed from her chest. And whiles away, there is an angry witch who has been watching all along-a witch who just watched her greatest triumph be taken down, and in an act of good rather than the act of evil that she'd wanted it to maintain in order to ressurect Rumenea inside of Ninjago. Katherine has seen what became of her creation, and she is NOT happy._

**Sypnosis: **Seiko Mitsuhide lives a pretty normal life, as far as normal things go: she's a single mom with a handful-of-a 5 year old son, lives in a run-down apartment with her best friend, and struggles to pay the bills with crappy coffee-shop wages and borrowed money. There's nothing particularly SPECIAL about it, if you don't count the idea that she's the Yin, a cursed human being who can control shadows into a doorway to the realm of Void. But, underneath that, she has the agenda that everyone else does when it comes to being the sister of a particularly famous actor/ex-earth ninja. Except for when it comes to the news from a psychic friend of hers named Zane Montgomery, who claims in a trance that she's in danger of being followed by someone who lurks in great power, someone waiting for the right moment to strike her. This is new information to Seiko, who had no idea she had a stalker-but even worse, Zane says that Seiko is the apple of a VERY ancient, VERY powerful witch's eye, and this witch plans to take Seiko for her own benefit, for who knows what reason.

...

Noel Smith is the King of the Underworld—UNDER-AGED, mind you. After his father disappeared mysteriously, he's unwillingly been left with the reigns to the Kingdom of Death, something he'd hoped he would've been able to build an immunity up to before he had to take it. No matter, there's something more important he's got on his mind, and that centers around the human girl he's been keeping tabs on since their first brief meetings many years ago: Seiko Mitsuhide. When he happens to_overhear _that she's in danger, well, what noble King could resist the offer to step up and protect his dark princess?

Noel must leave the Underworld and travel to the Upperworld to keep her safe, no matter the cost of leaving the underworld. Problem is, Noel's suspicious older brother, Eloquim, seems to be getting more and more shady by the second he looks at him. He has to make a sudden, life changing choice: Leave the Underworld to protect Seiko and ultimately, by rules, hand over the throne to the kingdom he could care less about to his brother, who is bound to be cooking something deadly up, or stay in the Underworld to make sure his brother doesn't do anything stupid and risk letting her get hurt—or worse, _killed_?

…

Yuki Akamatsu is a droid. A droid created by the greatest Tinkerer that Ninjago has _ever _seen, Dr. Julien Juliens, a man to be admired by all for is vast army of robots. Though all of his creations were not built with the ability to feel human emotion, Yuki is different—for some reason, his founding father gave him the mythical ability to _feel _things with his "heart" and his "skin". He doesn't know WHY Julien chose him to be the way he was. He's desperate to figure out the reason for his creation, the reason for his upbringing into the mechanical world, but with Julien dead, there is no one to ask.

When Yuki turns the corner of his home's wall one afternoon, he stumbles upon a very, very familiar face—a face that is exactly the same face as the woman he once loved. The issue, though, is that he watched the woman he loved get stabbed to death many years ago right before his eyes in a desperate war between robots and humans. There is no way she could be alive. Then Yuki learns that this girl that he's met is _not _the woman he loved, but rather one that has the same exact face. His theory is unconventional doppelgangers, but that sounds crazy, even to a robot.

Then one day, suddenly, the girl he met by accident—or perhaps destiny—is suddenly in danger. When he is commanded by an entranced Zane claiming to being controlled by the spirit of a woman named Maya to keep Seiko safe from harm, Yuki can't help but feel skittish and protective all at once. He knows that he probably should not feel connected to this girl he knows absolutely NOTHING about, but for some reason, Yuki cannot tear himself away from her, take his eyes off of her long enough to convince himself that this is not the same woman he loved, and there is no connection between the two. The idea of her being in fatal danger the way that the entranced Zane claimed makes Yuki devastated, and sick. Is it because he does not want to watch Mitsuko's destiny relive itself? Is it because he cannot bear to see an innocent young woman get hurt by what she can't control? Or is this connection Yuki is feeling far deeper than what his programming can ever name?  
...

It is no coincidence that Yuki and Noel both have the desire to keep Seiko safe from Katherine. If there's one thing they'll learn at all after this, its that _History always likes to repeat itself._

**_Note: *there are minor appearances from Ninjago characters. Zane, Cole, and Lloyd are basic._**

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**So, guys, I hope you go have an AWESOME day/night!**

-Kairi


	17. 16: Can You Say 'Ouija' ?

_16. Can You Say 'Ouija'?_

Jay stared at the screen of his smartphone , deadweight in his hands, all inspiration for the rest of his narrative gone cold. He didn't exactly know why his whole body felt numb; it was an itching feeling that was starting to make him feel like he'd just eaten a huge banquet for a family gathering. The bloating in his stomach was too full of butterflies that wouldn't stop fluttering, and not in the sick-good way he had felt when he first took Nya out on a date at a corny eatery in Mega Monster Amusement Park. Remembering how simple it was to be human—and a hero—made him think about how far his relationship with Nya had come. He used to be nervous as could be, shaking and stumbling over his words when he went to talk to her, his palms getting sweaty, his face turning red. He used to make a fool of himself every time he saw her, thinking she was the most beautiful girl he'd ever seen. He no longer found himself being so love-struck to the maximum where he made himself sound like an idiot every time he wanted to talk to her. He was still stuck on love, but it didn't make him so naïve anymore. Jay was more mature about the way he addressed his situation now—and learning that Nya didn't mind him being so quirky now and then helped him overcome his fear. Of course, he'd run into major self-esteem issues when Nya turned out to be pregnant with Cole's child and not Jay's, but the experience had helped Jay grow stronger. He no more treated himself like he was not as worthy of joy. He had clenched his fist when it came down to the heartbreak, and though he lived a hard life on that, it made him the stronger man he was today.

Jay slipped his phone in his pocket, having disconnected a call with Cole. Cole had been more shocked to hear that Zane was at Jay's house—Jay had already heard that Zane had been at Kai's, apparently still supposed to be there, and by Cole's words, it said that there was going to be a setback in the schedule. "Yuki was supposed to be picking Zane up from _Four Weapons," _Cole had groaned, sounding the _what a drag _horns just as could be when Sensei used to wake them up early in the morning for training. "Damn it, and I'm hallway to your place…"

"Can't you call him and tell him?" Jay had asked, avoiding the answer that was right in front of him, and no, he was not talking about the mayonnaise sitting on the counter by the sink.

"Yuki doesn't have a phone, and even if he did, I wouldn't have his number." The sound of tires squealing had forced Jay to pull the phone away from his ear. "I have to go back and get him, if he hasn't figured out that Zane's gone by now. Hopefully he hasn't sent himself out on a one-man search party and I won't have to go look for him… How is Zane doing?"

Cole said it like Zane was in a hole, like he had a reason to be pitied, that there was something wrong and underlying that he hadn't told Jay. Maybe it had something to do with the unnamed present that Cole was bringing over with him. Jay had thrown a look over his shoulder at his friend, with Onyx wrapped up in the essence of Zane's nose squinched between his fingers at the time. "He seems…docile. Discounting the angry fumes he's got rolling off of him, he's doing fine. What happened with Kai really riled him up. I've never seen him _that upset _before."

"What happened with Kai…?" Cole sounded cluelessly impatient. "Look, never mind. I'm sure you guys can tell me the whole story when I get there. Just keep Zane comfortable; I'm on my way back to _Four Weapons."_

"Gotcha…"

Jay turned now, catching Nya's eye. She had taken back Onyx from Zane's arms already and had him scoring the floor with his hands and knees, content with bubbly noises around the pacifier that she'd stuck between his baby lips. He had little white socks over his feet, wearing stretchy pants that were more comfortable for babies, and a little cotton t-shirt big enough for a teddy bear. At the very moment, Nya's eyes flashed with the worry he used to see before he and his friends headed out for a mission that Sensei set them out on. It was numbed before he could bolster her. He heard the cry of a very upset little girl coming from the living room. Jay sighed when he heard Rie's shouts coming from the cushions of the couch. Since Zane got here, the older children confined themselves to the living room, leaving Jay to know conflict would write itself in there eventually as it always did, with Rie dead-center. He only had time to take a couple of steps for the living room when Rie came flying out of the entrance, her face streaked with tears.

Bansh-Rie streaked into the kitchen. Instead of transplanting herself in the path towards her mother Rie ran straight to Jay, arms outheld with her face in the same of a theatre mask. She gave the cry that kids usually gave when they got a serious boo-boo. She stretched out her arms to be held, to be comforted by Jay's embrace, that always warmed her with love, even if she was the product of something he liked not to think about.

Jay normally wasn't the one that Rie went to when she wanted someone to pay her sympathy. He, always trying to get closer to her to prove to himself that he could connect with the child that came from old news, held out his arms for her to become a part of, hoping that this was a sign that they were stepping closer down their relationship for future days. She wrapped her arms around Jay's neck and buried her face in his shirt. Her cries worsened.

_Someone should take a picture of this. This never happens. _He laid a gentle hand on the back of her soft head, tracing her long braid with his hand curled around its rope-like feel. Children's screams were typically dialed to loud, but Bansh-Rie could've held a world record for how loud she screamed when she needed to. He knew that she was being overdramatic about whatever had happened, coming from prior knowledge and influences that decreed she was a drama queen, so he was probably only doing this because she wanted attention. Blowing things out of proportion was her favorite passing time when it came to perfecting a _'skill' _of hers. Nya came to Jay's side, rubbing her daughter's back, and maintained a smidge of concern. Like Jay, she was skeptical of how reliable it was to trust that Rie was serious about whatever she was crying over.

"What happened?" Nya asked, rubbing her hand over Rie's back. Jay continued to hold onto her with the strength he'd earned as a father. The little girl was mumbling something around her tears, her words hard to hear.

"What?" Jay asked, making her lean back so he could see her face but Rie wouldn't take it out of his shoulder. Her head whipped back and forth. "What happened? Seriously, tell me."

The girl snapped her head back, screeching Bansh-Rie style, her words were muffled as though she had a sucking candy in her mouth, but Nya didn't buy those for fear that Onyx would grab one and choke. Jay's first thought was to inspect her for any signs of something being lodged in her throat, maybe a toy she'd been had with, but she was talking _around _something—the noises clearly didn't come from someone who was choking. He couldn't have figured it out for anything.

Her mumblings continued to backhand any sense they could've made, but Jay's tuned ear finally caught up on a little bit of Ninjean. "He told me to, Mommy…sorry, so sorry…couldn't stop…he made me…didn't…tried but couldn't stop…"

"Who made you do what?" Jay asked. He found it hard to believe that Noah, the only boy present in the living room with her, would tell her to do something, and even then, Rie had a problem with doing exactly opposite of what she was told. Cole said that it ran in the family like the blood in their veins, and it couldn't be helped, not even with good discipline. He made several analogies to his deranged sister when he made these points, explaining that there would not be an antidote on earth that could deter Rie from doing unlike she was told. He said the best way to work with it was to use it against her. So with that being said, nothing Noah could've told her to do would be done. Noah wasn't even one to ask much of his half-sister, claiming that she had some startling effect on others that he wanted to keep far from. _At least my son's got a good head on his shoulders, _Jay had thought more than once when Rie was visiting the condemned corner again, for the next and certainly not the last time. Noah would _never _do anything wrong. There was no way he'd do wrong.

Rie dug her fingernails into Jay's shoulders. Her next words were perfectly clear. "The man in the living room! He made me do it—he just told me to, and I didn't want to, but I did for some reason—I didn't know how to stop—I'm so sorry!"

Jay exchanged a glance with Nya. _The man…in the living room?_

There was a split second of time where, in her quick lashings of her head back and forth, Rie stopped moving. That split second was enough time for Jay to see all he needed to see, turning his blood cold and his heart to ice. Winter could've swept through the kitchen, and Jay would've been so caught up in the season that he'd never be able to break out of it.

She was mumbling…because she had fangs. White, long, pointed and glistening with saliva, their tips dipped deep scarlet.

From the living room, Jay and Nya suddenly heard an awful scream, a scream that could've been anyone's, but there wasn't a doubt that it was from one of their children that had gotten hurt.

_"Natille!"_

Jay had no clue how he put Rie down safely and crossed the room in bare minimum of .23 seconds. Zane was closer to the door than him, and even _Nya _was closer to the door than him, but he couldn't be beaten by either. He crossed through rooms first, like diving between dimensions by just the slip through the veil separating them. He barely even _noticed _that he'd gotten there first until he felt Nya plunge into his back when he came to a sharp stop, and the sound of Zane's startled grumble coming from the caboose of the _fright_ train. Maybe he got in there from his lightning-fast abilities. Jay had read somewhere that when activated, high levels of adrenaline can make humans do some pretty crazy things. They can go from incredible strength, to impossible speed, to catching serious air. Afterwards, though, they usually had pretty bad strains on their muscles that lasted for _months. _Jay could've been going through that—his panic may have triggered adrenaline—but that was a stretch to say when you were the former ninja of lightning, who could control something like that with a quick snap of the fingers. Seemed unrealistic that he'd have his adrenaline pump at a time like this, but you never know, do you?

He searched for the man that Rie claimed was in the living room. Logically, the man could've snuck in the back door, located off the corner of the living room across from the door to the _entry _of the living room. Problem with that theory was that from where Jay had been standing, he would've been able to see this so-called 'intruder' the second he tried to slip into the glass-windowed door. There was no way anyone would've been able to surpass that incredibly obvious, tackily _squeaky _door without having somebody notice. Not even Cole, a professional vampire, could master the door without having it make a noise, once trying on Halloween last year when Nya and Jay were in the living room watching a rather disturbing movie. The door had soiled his plans, and the only scary part of that expedition was that Cole was suddenly walking in their back door like it was his own house. So if the King of Silence couldn't own that door, then how could a stranger come in when eyes _and _ears would've been able to detect his entry?

And even then, why wouldn't the kids have made some sort of warning noise, a scream, a shout, a cry or question? Everything about Rie's story wasn't adding up, from the intruder to the overdramatic cries—it looked fabricated, except there was one thing that Rie couldn't fake, and that was her fangs.

Well, the living room was definitely in disarray from the toys the children were playing with, but they weren't thrown in a haphazard way indicating struggle that mysteriously the adults hadn't even noticed. They were moved around in the way that kids play. They throw stuff. Stuff gets chucked. It happens. There was _nothing in here _saying that a man, disbelonging of the household, was in here, commanding around Jay's children like a ruler. The story looked too fake to be real from here.

Only…

Jay had three children. One was in the kitchen, on the floor. Two were in here with Rie, playing toys, probably acting out the part in _Wizard of Oz _when the tornado comes along 'cause that's exactly what it looks like was being simulated.

But there was only _one _child in here, and he looked terrified.

Noah was pressed to the back wall of the room, his chest puffed out so he could hold all of his breath. His palms lay flat against the wall behind him. He kept his shoulders pulled to his ears. He stood on his tippy-toes, trying to make himself as much a part of the wall as possible, looking down his nose at his father with great wideness in their usually-droopy manner. He couldn't move. He was glued there with fear.

Noah didn't usually act like this. He _never _acted like this. One more thing to add to the growing list of things wrong with everything that was going on right now. He reached out, communicating through comfort. _What did he see? _"Noah?" he asked, hoping to get through to his son. Jay wanted to run to him, grab him, carry him out of here, and find out why exactly he'd shrieked his missing sister's name—possibly pinpointing where she was altogether. Natille's fluffy red head wasn't anywhere to be seen. She wasn't that hard to miss when she _was _present. Jay hadn't seen her leave the room at all—again, he was standing right in front of the only option she could've taken to exit, lest she would use the back door, but he'd already been over this. No one could enter or exit without Jay noticing.

All in all, he was terrified. His eyes scoured every ridge, every blind side that the jut-out couch presented to see if maybe Natille was hiding somewhere, trying to scare her parents, but she wasn't anywhere. There weren't many places for a girl her size to hide.

Jay's feet didn't listen when he told them to go to his son. They were glued to the floor, as Jay's eyes were stuck to his son, trying to figure out what was scaring him so. It seemed like Nya _and _Zane were having the same problem communicating movement with their own stiff limbs. Both stopped beside him. Neither could export so much as a wheeze of breath. Everything in the small room was still, the house fallen silent but the cries of Rie in the kitchen that infectiously spread onto her little brother's mind. Onyx now joined the chorus of wails with his high-pitched fervor for crying. Dimly, he heard his father trying to crow his grandson into a quiet, along with Rie, but so far, that plan was at failure.

All Jay could do was stare. He couldn't move. The words that needed to be said stayed put in his throat, the chords that made them worth something suddenly becoming dysfunctional at a very inconvenient poise. Noah stared at his father, lip quivering. What could cause a child to look so afraid, other than what Jay was presuming happened that involved Rie's fangs and, well, the _blood _that dripped off their vertex?

And then, Nya could only croak out the bleakest sound: "Where's Natille?" Jay wasn't even sure that Noah could hear her, in the blood-rush that he must've been feeling creep into his head. Feeling a little dizzy himself he could conquer. _Something…isn't right, _he finally found himself able to brace conjecture. The air in the room was heavy, sprinkled with a divinable essence of rumored flair, downcast with something that was sprayed in so easily it could've belonged to _Febreze, _but it did not smell clean. It smelled like…

Well, like Death had paid a visit.

When Jay just began to believe Noah's frozen ears couldn't document Nya's inaudible sounds, Noah's eyes ripped from his father's as soundfully as the tear of cloth or paper, and dragged themselves up until what they reached was some point above Jay's head on the ceiling. That is where his eyes took shape, all of the circle within them becoming visible, which is not normal for eyes to do. Every inch of his iris was so blatant, Jay could've measured the exact circumference, found the diameter, and calculated the radius right then and there. They were _that _visible.

Jay couldn't make himself move anything, nothing but his cracked lips leading into his dry mouth. His feet were lead; his hands were stone. His shoulders remained weighty. There was nothing but a stream of bedlam thoughts running in an endless loop through his dizzied, aching mind. A common cold seemed to have come over him. He felt weak. His throat even hurt to use. "…Noah?"

Something wet, warm, and thick, almost syrupy, dripped onto Jay's cheekbone. The pitter-patter of the rain-like plop turned his spine into hard mold. Down the bottom of his eye, Jay could only see a wad of something dark, and his skin could feel it creeping down the curve of his cheek and towards his upper lip. It moved fast enough for there only to be a second between impact, and taste.

The metallic flavor was one that Jay knew easily—he'd tasted it much before, from jamming papercuts into his mouth to biting down too hard on his tongue, from getting punched hard in the face and having one of his teeth bleed to the drizzle of a bloody nose into his parted lips.

It was blood.

He tipped back his head slowly, dreading what he'd find. Whatever it was had to be exactly what Noah was looking at, what was making him dig his nails hard into the paint of the wall and start to peel away at the light coat. Jay's mind flashed with the image of a body dangling from the ceiling only by one strained rope, but he knew their house well enough to know that they didn't have rafters for a rope to hang _from. _At least that possibility could be ruled out. Heart taking over his ears, Jay looked up, holding his breath.

Black dots danced impossibly in his vision.

Nya's horrified shriek filled the house with despair. It terrorized the homely living room into a graveyard's cellar, her cry the caw of a picky crow streaming over the mist fogged grass, wishing he could dig into whatever prizes lie beneath the cracked headstones, what reeked of lunch. Of Death.

Zane jumped back so roughly that the desk against the wall slammed into it, a loud slam and the shatter of a broken picture frame culminating the last of the death bell's toll.

Jay's words kept to his throat. Nya raised her hands to her face, tears running out of her eyes and smudging their dark makeup into pits lacking beauty, turning herself into a black-eyed zombie. Her hands flanked her mouth's noise. "_Natille!" _she sobbed. _"Natille! _Oh, my baby—my _baby-y-y_…" Nya fell to the floor in a dead mound.

Jay's daughter was hanging there in an odd position. She looked like she'd been crawling across the ceiling as if it were the floor, her knees scraped from dragging across the bumpy popcorn. Her white dress was dangling down from her body over their heads, many feet above them, and her hair was blithely flaccid as if she were swinging on a set, tilting her head back as she flew higher. Natille loved to swing on the set. She always said that it felt like flying, and Natille's biggest dream, she said, was to grow wings, and fly until there was no more sky to fly in.

Her eyelids were shut, but her neck was arched backwards, her lifeless body without support for her heavy head. On her neck was a mask of blood, drenched over the front of her white dress, now trickling downwards over her face and down her temples into her hair as gravity called to it. Her _neck…_it looked like it was torn wide open.

But the most disgusting part of it all was that Natille wasn't suspended there by nothing. Further examination showed Jay that her palms, flat to the ceiling, were kept there…by _nails. _

The same fell for her ankles.

Jay's noise of disgust filled his eyes with tears. His stomach rolled. He couldn't take the sight of it—his baby girl, tacked here by—by _carpenter nails, _of all things—his baby girl with her throat ripped out, her face covered with blood, her lifeless body eating at his sanity with pointed teeth, the fangs of Rie. Rie, who'd eaten her half-sister alive.

It felt like a thick black mist fell over Jay's head, limiting what he could see through the dark fog. He knew it was just his mind, doing something to him to make him see this, like the black dots that roamed his eyesight seconds after seeing his thumbtacked daughter on the ceiling. The fog in his eyes looked to him like what happened when you squinted them, and your lashes selectively blocked the opening of vision you barely had quality to see through; the image of Natille was now laced with black, blurry and unable to be seen. This fog that fell over him was darker than his lashes ever had been. It made him angry. It made him _furious. _His emotions that should've felt despair were now tracked into a quarry where only anger could control everything. And the worst part was that he was _accepting _it.

Despite all the things that weren't adding up, Jay tried to get mad at Rie. He tried to get mad at her for engineering some ridiculous story about a man who had 'made her' do that to her sister. He tried to provoke himself into wanting to rage her away, to throw her outside, wait for Cole to come, and send her away with him; he didn't want to care about what strange things were going on with Zane and Kai or what unnamed present Cole was bringing over with him. He wanted to be filled with such hate for Rie that he'd be okay if he sent her off into the streets, whether it hurt Nya to see her go or not. This—this was _unacceptable. _To do something so brutal to her half-sister when they got along just fine, to try and _lie _about it? Jay had never been completely on board with the idea of an affair baby coming from Nya's behalf living under the same roof as him, a baby cursed from its very night of conceiving. He'd never truly been _okay _with Rie living here, had he? From day one, he'd wanted to throw her to the streets. He'd wanted to see her suffer. Hell, he didn't want to see her at _all. _He _hated _her because of what she'd come from. She'd come from something that caused Jay _so much pain it hurt _for months, and he'd never really gotten over it, had he? She had come from the product of his best friend and his girlfriend shaking up over the summer when Jaya hit a relatively _small flippin' bump in the road. _It was just a little FIGHT, and then Nya turned around and slept with _Cole. _It had made Jay feel _worthless. _He'd been so hurt for the longest time. In movies, girls _always _went for the leader of a group, and Jay had felt special that Nya picked him over the leader, because that happened in pretty much EVERY movie that he'd seen. Even in the movies about sparkly vampires that Nya forced him to watch when they began dating, the werewolf leader had been the one who got the girl—he had two girls practically _fighting _over him, although he'd severely marred one girl's face with his fat claws, but still. Jay had been proud to be the one Nya chose. And then, all of the sudden, she didn't want him anymore. She picked Cole. She _betrayed _him for _Cole. _Stronger, faster, "hotter" Cole, who had everything Jay didn't. Cole. SHE HAD PICKED COLE, AND HAD HER FIRST CHILD WITH _HIM. _

Gosh, he was _so angry he could just choke her right now—_she was already choking on her tears, anyway; all it would take was him to bend down beside her, lace his fingers over her throat, and squeeze until—

_Wait, what? _Jay felt like lightning had struck him, electrifying him out of the angry fog until the black mass that had settled over his head cleared away better than the winds could've blown them. It disintegrated right before his eyes. He was left shaken, stirred, and helpless. The anger towards Rie and Nya evaporated.

_Why was I thinking that? _Jay asked himself, his body heavier than before. _I don't hate either of them. I hate what happened, but I certainly don't hate them. _

"Dad?"

Jay's tired eyes looked at Noah, numb enough to fall to the fight. Noah swallowed hard. His throat bobbed over the saliva he probably didn't even have to swallow. "Dad, he's in her," he said, so softly Jay barely heard.

Jay couldn't summon words that could ask the question he wanted to pardon. Four letters and a question mark couldn't even come to mind. He didn't even know how to spell the word so jumbled by many overuses that it seemed inconsequential to use. His little girl, hanging above his head, dripped blood onto him, from her tacked hands, from her neck, from somewhere. Jay didn't want to look. His head was too heavy to raise.

"The man," Noah whispered. His lip bobbed. "He's inside Natille."

Jay swayed on his feet. The heavy air in the room was almost too much to bear, but he strengthened his forces against it, trying to keep his lead footing long enough to look back up and see his daughter, one last time. Just once, he begged, before he fell victim to the martyred sleep that all wanted to fall into after giving their life for what cause did they owe. His eyes breached on his daughter.

She, who formerly had been closed lidded, stared back.

Stared back, poltergeist, with all white eyes.

Jay forgot how to speak or scream or move or react to this. _Where are her eyes? _He thought, shoulders sagging, knees starting to become too wobbly to hold his weight. Strength prevaricated him. _Where are my baby girl's eyes?!_

Somehow, Jay knew it was he she was looking at when a thin, duly insane grin deformed her lips. He was ready to sleep, but the captivating story that her empty eyes told kept him lifted, as if _she _was the one holding him up.

Faintly, he heard Nya calling for her daughter, but Jay's mind dashed. _She's already gone, _he thought out of nowhere. He didn't know what that meant, didn't understand what it _could _mean, but continued to believe it anyway. What did he mean, she was already gone? Where did she go?

Natille's voice was not her own.

There was an echo behind her words. More than one voice conducted what passed through the pocket between her lips. The voice sounded like it was backing her up, almost telling her what she was supposed to say, then saying it along with her tiny, before harmless words. It came deeper than six feet under, playing orange against Natille's blue. It battled hers. Morgan Freeman had nothing on this voice that dug graves beneath Natille, and with the combination of these voices, the saying "she's already gone" made more sense than anything else did right now. The man the children claimed, the one not just Rie but _Noah _saw too, was "in Natille." In. Like possession.

Something big was being cooked in the universe. Jay hadn't ever seen anything like this in real life that had nothing to do with _The Exorcist. _This kind of stuff was cryptically unmanageable, saved for only cinema screens, a sin that should never have been imagined when people decided scary movies completed the world. Children were not meant to crawl on the ceiling, and they were not meant to have 2 voices _or _eyes without irises. They weren't meant to grow fangs and attack their siblings. This wasn't possible.

And yet…Here it was, being lived just before Jay's very eyes.

"_It's coming for you, Daddy," _said 'Natille.' The duet of the dark man's voice beyond hers rang forth at the same time. Jay felt his bones quiver with ultimate price. "_Can't you feel it? He's coming for you. For _all_ of you." _The snake-like hisses coiled around Jay's spine, trying to drag him down with the weight he was already feeling. How much heavier would he get before he broke through the floor?

He could only meet the eyes of the devil inside of her, whatever power it held over him taking him out of threat. He couldn't speak, couldn't move, wanted to fall asleep as if a heavy weight was sitting on top of him. Jay tipped back his head, glaring into the overpass of his daughter's possessed body, struggling to stay awake. "Natille's" creepy smile broadened. _"Can't you feel how willing he is to kill the two of you?" _they asked, and finally Jay noted that Zane, too, was struggling to keep his balance. Jay could hardly turn over his chin so he could look to his friend. They both were bent over like old men, haunched, struggling. He hadn't realized that Nya, too, had fallen silent until now it occurred to him that he was not alone in the bubble of resent trying to push them all under. She was on the floor, where she'd fallen—but was fast asleep like she'd just happened to feel like taking a nap, face peacefully flattened out as to where nothing leaked through her black-streaked face. She'd eclipsed under the power. It was too much for her to handle.

Nya was strong enough to fight. She'd lost. What did that say about how easily Jay was willing to accede?

He looked back up at Natille. Again he felt cold air sweep over his body, someone swatting a huge invisible fan to slow him down, keep him from sticking against it. Jay's muscles glitched. _I'm ready to fall, _he thought, almost bowing at this point. He gritted his teeth. He needed to keep standing, to keep tall, and save his daughter from whatever _thing _was taking her over, tacking her to the damn ceiling to keep her there. He wouldn't let it do this to her. He grunted, pushing up his legs against the weight of a thousand deaths sitting on his shoulders, feeling his teeth biting into one another hard enough to break down enamel to gum. _I have to fight this! _Jay had been done being belted around many years ago. Now, after regaining his confidence and strength back, Jay was a turned man, the father of three (sort-of four) and the husband of Nya, who he earlier explained had been his Kryptonite back then. Things had changed since last breath of his fate with impending doom. He was not who he was.

He was _strong. _

"_The Greater…He haunts your every action," _spilled Natille and her demons. "_He has chosen you to be the next of the Devastated. He has already taken the loved ones of he who stands at your side faithfully…Next, he targets your beloved circle of family. Soon, every one of you will lose what you worked so hard to get, and there will be _nothing _left once he is done with you. You will all be taken down before _it _even starts." _With her perplexing words set to the side, a wet suckling noise attached to the sight of Natille slowly raising one of her hands off the nail that kept her hanging from the ceiling. Blood splurted as the little girl drug her hand literally from its pin, taking the hard, disgusting way out of her situation. Blood sprayed onto Jay's head, turning his already red hair into a sickening literal twist. Natille's hand drug off the nail until it pried through the head and left blood to seep out of her hands entirely. Then she began to do the exact same ritual with her other hand and ankles. Jay couldn't take it any longer. Watching this happen to his daughter, no matter what spell he was held under if it be the greatest one ever witched, was _not _acceptable, and he wasn't going to stand for letting some freak hurt his baby girl _any longer. _

"That's _enough," _Jay growled through his teeth, spit mixing with the blood splatters staining red dots into the floor Nya always shouted about keeping clean. He pressed back his shoulders, muscles straining backwards harder than anything they had ever pushed against, particularly to make a point of the _invisible _weight keeping them down. His arms shook in the fight. "I will _not _let you do this to my family _anymore. _Get the _hell_" he yelled, _"out of my daughter!" _

Jay reared back, launching whatever it was keeping him down off his back into the air. He was set free from it, the burden. The second he felt the heave disconnect from him, Jay reached up towards his daughter like it was actually _possible _to grab her from all the way down here. That was the ricochet of her sudden dart to the right. She'd escaped her naily prison, and now she was able to scurry like a mouse across the ceiling expertly. Her actions said that this was normal for her, she did this every day, this was no biggie, when in real life, he didn't even think Natille knew what a popcorn ceiling _felt _like. The controller of his daughter's enterprise scattered over the ceiling, making for the door to the kitchen over he and Zane's head. Jay wanted to immediately worry about Nya and Noah, also slumped to the base of the wall in total exhaust, but he knew she'd be okay at least until he got Natille off the ceiling, and hopefully out of _its _hold.

Jay grabbed Zane's arm, pulling his hunched-form so hard that he knew he'd ripped him out from underneath the rug sitting on top of him. Natille was already in the kitchen, tracks away from being seen—he had to follow her. After grabbing Zane out of his keep, he took off out the door, finding his father and Jay's two uncaptivated children still in there, but dead silent. His father threw him a worried glance. "Jay!" he cried.

"GET THEM OUT OF HERE! GET NYA! DO—SOMETHING!" Jay hollered over his shoulder. Natille had run into the ceiling of the staircase, crawling over the slope at probably world record for the fastest crawl of a child that could ever be documented, but of course without professional oversee, nobody would have reason to believe Jay. Assuming he were crazy enough to want to _tell the world _about what was happening here and warrant a worldwide prediction of the little girl that ran over ceilings while under possession.

He followed the trail of blood drops to her resting place.

Don't ask him how he knew that Zane was behind him as he ran up the stairs after his daughter, shouting, "_Get out!" _as loudly (and threateningly) as he could. Zane's overall link to this whole thing was taped to Jay's back. He followed, and if he didn't, that means he'd be taken over by whatever the _hell _it was that kept his daughter under.

Natille dashed over the popcorn towards the bedroom row that was laid out in absentee regality. It looked without a doubt like the place you'd have your family, the bookshelves exploding with books and movies and board games just for the small family area that was bigger and more tolerable than the laughable half-try downstairs. This place looked absolutely clean. If this problem was ever resolved, Jay vowed to gut the downstairs living area; he would never be able to look at it after what was happening in this day-turned-nightmare now.

Jay ran towards the only open door that Natille could go into, and that was he and Nya's room. She wasted no time running over the ceiling into his room.

"Jay—" said Zane from behind him. Jay threw a glance over his shoulder. Zane looked like he was barely hanging on to consciousness.

"FIGHT IT!" Jay told him, grabbing onto Zane's wrist and pulling him along. _First time seeing you in, what, four years? Isn't this such a great way to reconnect? Chasing demons just like the good old times. Brings back memories, don't it? _NO. This wasn't even CLOSE to being acceptable. Jay's furiousness and will to return his daughter's body back to normal was more great than anything he'd ever desired to do. The sleeve of Zane's shirt was the thread of his confidence, here. He needed Zane's help to get _it _out of his daughter. If Zane gave up the fight to the power _now, _Jay might as well just fall asleep on his bed and forget everything that transpired this creepy afternoon.

The sun was setting through his windows when Jay launched himself into the bedroom, following Natille with every ounce of power he had in him. As soon as Zane came to the room, the final passenger boarding the Insane Train, Jay slammed the door shut, giving _it _less options to choose from when running away from him. Zane followed lead and cut her off at the bathroom door. There was nowhere left for her to go but in circles on the ceiling, and that would get her caught either way. Jay leaped onto the bed, listening to grotesque noises she made around the gurgle of blood in her throat, leaving trails of it on the floor at every twitch and turn she made. The bright light streaming through the wide window behind her raised the hairs on the back of his chilled neck. Nightfall was coming over the bend. It turned the sight of her blood deep orange. On his bed, he could reach for her when she came close, but she learned better not to puncture her father's small square of capture, and kept to the parts of the room where Zane and the rod from the inside of Jay's closet—_when did he get that? _wondered Jay—could barely even get to her.

"_You'll only meet devastation," _said Natille and her other voice. "_That is all destiny has designed for you, you see. This will only lead you closer."_

"GET OUT OF MY BABY!" Jay yelled. He made a grab for her, but she moved out of reach at the last second, leaving him to stumble over his bedsheets like a doorknob, trying to catch Natille's bug representation. Her arms were bent funny to keep closer to the ceiling. Her white eyes seemed beyond reach.

And as Jay had always known, Zane is a genius.

He began _freezing _the ceiling, limiting Natille's access to it without slipping her grip and falling, therefore ending this tirade. Jay grinned. _By the devil, _he thought, watching Zane slowly coat every part of the ceiling except for a square that he was slowly forcing Natille to enter, just above the bed. She was within reach. The cold air drifting off the ice was harmful to Jay's prickling skin that wasn't used to such weather in a place as random as his own bedroom, but he was willing to face, if it meant returning his daughter safely into his arms. _"You might trap me," _hissed _it. _It drifted entirely into Jay's square. His bed was the bungee for his feet, and he reached for Natille last moment, failing her as _it _carried her around him in confusing circles. _"But you won't be able to win. I will terminate ALL YOU HAVE! I am the Greater, and I _CANNOT BE DEFEATED_!"_

_Heard that one before._

Jay's hand grabbed a fistful of his daughter's slack skirt, and he tugged. She ripped off the ceiling, bloody parts and all, straight to his arms, where she was the safest from harm. When he caught her, he flipped her over so that he could wrap his arms around her, pulling her as close to him as possible without worrying about the danger that might've put him in. His daughter's legs wrapped around his waist in response. Noises that sounded normal, consistent with real childlike calls of gloom, to a real child's phonetic dictionary of noises. She didn't gurgle, or hiss, or growl. She whimpered and cried into her father's shoulder, kept her arms tightly around him as she screamed in hurt. Jay fell down to his knees on the bed with her, burying his face in her hair, the scent of Death long gone from her body. She shook wholly in his touch.

_It's gone, _he thought. The father breathed a sigh of relief into her hair. "Natille," he whispered, clutching her small body against him. It was tight enough to be like a Constrictai's raveled grapple. His heart pounded against her as she cried for him.

_"Daddy!" _she sobbed. "_Daddy!" _

_"Shhh," _he whispered, stroking her hair, holding her face to his shoulder. "You're safe now, you're safe. I'm so sorry, baby." Natille had always been the odd child out—she held nothing inside of her that was like her parents, rather unemotional and obvious and wordy when it came to tacky child explanations and reasons. She was technical. She was candid. She didn't beat around the bush when it came to things. She'd been a little off of the others, but it made Jay love her absolutely more, for every difference she had. He loved every part of his weird little Munchkin. He loved her for every bone she had, ever fiber, every heartbeat. This had reached a whole new level of _weird, _and he was sure she wouldn't ditch this without scars. She _would _have scars. And being a baby, she wouldn't take them lightly. But for now, all she wanted, the most emotion she'd ever shown in her whole life, was a hug from her father, and his comfort as her cement to hold herself together. Jay kissed her all over her head. "I'm so sorry, baby," he whispered. He put the crook between his browbone and the bridge of his nose on the top of her forehead. "I love you. I love you. It's okay. Shh. You're safe now."

He hadn't noticed Zane had crawled on the bed beside them. He looked torn down. Tired. _The power had a big effect on him, _Jay thought, and smiled at his half-lidded friend. "Thank you," he said.

"Yes."

Blood stained Jay's shirt. He could feel it adhering the cloth to his shoulders. He kissed Natille, hearing her screams of terror only toughen his brace, promising that this was the _last _anybody screwed with him—when it came down to family, he was serious. This wasn't a joke anymore. A little girl was hurt over whatever this "Greater" bitch was, and it was _Jay's _daughter, which made him three times the threat to whatever was trying to intimidate him. Jay stroked her soft head. "It's okay, baby. You're safe. You're safe."

_"Not quite." _

The deep voice return. Zane visibly flinched away from the echo in the room, bounding off the walls. Jay glanced down at his daughter in fear. Had it come back? Was it inside of her again? But when Natille tilted back her own head, showing her hazel eyes back to their normal color and filled with everything she shouldn't feel, Jay knew that it was no longer a part of her, but _with them, _here, now, watching. He looked up towards the thick shadow blocking out the light in his window.

It was a foggy black mist. A bubble, of sorts, so different from the pink bubblegum one that Glinda spirited through when giving unhelpful words of advice to Dorothy Gale. It changed shape as it hovered. It was large, about the side of two men's torsos shoved together, and it was a grayish thin on the inside, almost see-through, but didn't allow light to pass through it. _It's the mist that fell over my head earlier. The one that made me hate and hurt at the same time. _Jay tightened his hold on his daughter. "Get the hell away from my family!" He spat.

"_Now is not the time to call upon Hell,"_ said the voice. It no longer had Natille's beyond its own. Jay was certain that the voice's speaker was this floating organism. "_For I am Hell itself." _

And then the black dove on top of Jay, completely covering he and his daughter with its ice cold air. It was so cold inside…so cold his teeth chattered. He felt his whole body shut down with the sudden frost that came over him, sticking his body directly to Natille's when they became linked by ice. He gasped for breath inside of the black void. Inside…there was nothing but endless meadows of black. A sea, a storm, a field of black. He tried to breathe air that was too cold to exist. He choked on it.

Jay was dimly aware of being lifted. In here, he could hear nothing. He didn't know what was happening outside of the void, if it had swallowed Zane too; all he could feel was Natille wrapped around him, but she was not making a sound. Jay was floating as he was lifted.

Then, sound was all he could hear.

Glass shattering. Air suddenly being thrown into his face. Not only air, but something _sharp, _sticking into his body everywhere. His stomach was lost as he plummeted. He heard someone…Zane?...screaming his name, but his mind didn't recover quick enough to know just who it was. Natille was still in his arms. She wasn't screaming. Jay was falling, air rushing all around him, the world plummeting as he fell—he could briefly see the sky, light orange and pink as the sun came to its end. He looked at strands of orange, wondering if they were Sky Lights, when he realized it was Natille's hair being pushed into his face by the air that was blowing up against them as they came down. She was falling, too. Jay looked at the sky one more time. _How_ had he gotten outside, again?

Jay's body cracked against whatever was under to break his fall, but it didn't break the fall—it broke him. Jay cried out in agony when he felt things inside of him shatter so worthlessly you would believe he was made of glass. He didn't know what he hit. All he could see was the sky. Notes of pain scribbled over his brain, becoming too much for him to handle all at once, and Jay shut down seeing the puffy white clouds drifting across the sky overhead, wanting to reach out and pull them down here so he wouldn't hurt so bad anymore. His eyes blurred. Someone yelled his name. Told him to…stay…awake…But it was so hard…to keep…his eyes…_opennnn_…

Jay's eyes shut, and everything faded slowly into a sea of black once more.

…

"Oxygen. Give him more oxygen!"

Jay couldn't understand. His eyelids raised, so heavy he was tempted to bring them back down, but he was hit with the overwhelming smell of blood that he couldn't wash out of his body. He dimly remembered what happened, but his body was so engulfed in pain that he couldn't breathe, and it was hard to think of anything other than that. His vision was blurry. His head was pounding so fiercely drums could've been practicing refrain inside of his skull. Someone with baby blue latex gloves reached over to him and strapped something over his lower face, wrapping an itchy cord around either side of his ear so that a plastic dome was digging into the skin of his cheeks, and fresh air was pumped into his nostrils. His eyes rolled around. He tried to see what was happening, but everything was too blurry. He closed his eyes and moaned. _Natille, _he tried to say, _where's my daughter?_

"Hold on, Jay. We're getting you to the hospital."

He heard a steady beeping somewhere in the distance: A heartbeat monitor, replaying the sounds of his life in slow motion beyond him. If he listened hard enough, he could hear a siren wailing somewhere above him, a cry to move out of the way blasting throughout the air for everyone to let the vehicle pass through, taking Jay onto whatever destiny brought him to next. _Funny, _he thought drearily. _Lloyd was always the one who loved destiny just like candy. He thought destiny was behind everything that happened to him. And now, I'm the one letting destiny carry me along. _

A spark of pain lit up in his side, and Jay cried out, his body jerking upwards. Sets of hands wrapped around his flailing limbs to keep him down. The reaction only made him feel worse than he did before—he'd never been in so much physical pain in his whole life, and he'd been through a lot of crazy shit, too. This one, though, had to be the most ruining. It was excruciating.

Jay's head pounded. It rolled to the side as he felt the ambulance carry him forth. Somebody said something to him, but…he didn't have the will to listen anymore. The fresh oxygen pumped into his nose and filling his lungs coaxed him into a deep black pit again, but this time, Jay tried to climb out, clawing at whatever piece of the real world he could and holding onto it 'till it was strung thin. The slight hearing of words, coiled into a rope, snapped. He tumbled down into darkness that one never truly knows until he has once before reveled in the shadows that had only led him to light.

* * *

**Jay **is not dead. Okey? Just in great physical pain.

**Go have an awesome day/night!**


	18. 17: Back Down Under

_17. Back Down Under_

"Sir, I am delighted to inform you of a letter you have received from the Lord of Craglings," said Eustace, his accent lilted so dentedly that Noel had a hard time listening to him, twisting his head sufferably to the side so he could block out the noise that came out of the poor fat schnoz on his face. That was the problem with big-nosed servants: they couldn't control their nasal inadequacies, it seemed, and keep them out of their announcements long enough for Noel to know what the Elathan they were saying. He felt his lips automatically stretch thin in a charitable, uniform smile that had nothing but _you suck _behind it. He was sitting in his showy throne, body thrown back like he didn't give a damn about anything, his legs crossed hypertensively at the ankles, and his elbows resting on either arm of the throne. He kept his fingers laced together against his mouth. Currently, he was having quite the stare-down with the end of this very room, where tall doors pulled shut kept out all the ninnies trying to weasel their way into his castle and get a glimpse at him. The chambers were pretty off limits when it came to anyone not invited or part of Noel's staff, complete with two darkelven guards with deadly spears standing outside the tall wooden crested doors with a story carved into their fine white wood. It was some stupid story in pictures about how the King would bring satisfaction to all the demons with his reign, blah blah blah, and a bunch of family history stuff that was not worth the time it takes to read all of it and get what it means. Most of it was centered around Noel's late/AWOL father, Elathan, who had disappeared years ago in the account of the _kage-oni _taking their anger out on Kai and his bro-friends. It was pretty lame that it was all about how _awesome _Elathan was when he wasn't even, like, _present. _He'd disappeared to the point where he was just a wind in the door by now, and nobody frankly gave a damn about him anymore.

Noel was in a foul mood. He had started the day fine, but many factors led to the spiral of accordances, especially his heavy desire to toss in the towel and ditch Hell for a better life in the Upperworld. Forgive him, Father, for he has sinned against demonic belief, but he didn't _want _to be King. He hated the responsibility. He hated the _people _here because they were all idiots. IDIOTS. _None _of them had a brain in their head—and if they did, they were dicks to handle, keep at pace, and deserving of being chained to a tree and whipped until they had nothing to be whipped anymore. He wanted a vacation from all the meetings, the letters, the treaties, the schemes, the public speaking, the enforcement of rules, the prosecuting with higher judgment in impish court, and every _other _stupid King deal he'd signed up for when he came under investiture into the throne. It was ridiculous that his coroneted public was so profoundly stupid. It helped none that there wasn't a single educated being that was cerebrally able to steady a managerial position throughout the Kingdom of Death, like being a rule-enforcer or a magistrate. There were no civilized creatures here. It was miserable to have half a human brain and be cursed with stickling with _these _pyruvate-weak morons.

But what really started him into a fit was his _brother. _Don't get him wrong, Eloquim was quite the entertainer when he was irritated with some lazy quarter that Noel requested. He was especially amusing when he tried to scold Noel for what he described was a "lackadaisical, insouciant decree that did not consign actual affairs of the Underpeople." So there _was _some topic to him being here, but as of late, Noel's trust in him was beginning to abort ship.

Never mind Eustace's _communique _about the Lord of Craglings. Noel couldn't have cared less about creatures more brainless than those who headed villages in the Kingdom of Death. They were nothing but dense, cursed rocks that could move, but didn't have anything distinguishing them as _worthful _from the rest of the Underworld's faction. Letters seemed to be one of Eloquim's new fads, Noel suspiciously noticed but didn't call to words. He had been writing more than usual and sneaking off the letters through Eustace—Eustace was the letterkeeper, who managed all written accords between the King and other Underworlders—and making sure that Noel wasn't bothered with the letters, but don't think he didn't notice. In fact, Noel noticed _every _letter that came and went between his brother and whoever was important enough to _hide. _He would hear in the middle of the night the click-clack of Eustace's gauntlet heels schlepping over the floor towards the door adjacent to Noel's room. Which by all means he had dedicated to Eloquim out of sheer respect for his brother, for he could've stuck him in a guest ward and done away with the sick bastard, but what kind of host would he be if he shoved out his own blood into a place fit for anything lower than a human? He'd get on Eloquim's bad side, for certain, and in his highest qualms, he'd rather remain on the good side of the tracks just to keep himself close enough to whatever conspiracy the _kage-oni _damnation stirred. Eustace's late messages far into the night always rang out like gunshots in Noel's ears. He had listened through the door once, hearing the low tones of Eloquim and Noel's letterkeeper murmuring into the shadows of the corridors, so dark when light lacked.

_"A new letter has arrived, Lord Silas," _would say Eustace. "_It's from—"_

_"Shhh!" _Eloquim would quickly hiss. "_Keep quiet. I already know who it's from." _

_"Yes, my Lord." _

Noel knew his brother was up to something. Eloquim was a pitiful bastard and was not very efficient at sneaking around. Noel's expertise in sensing lies only underwired the suspicion that Eloquim's correspondence was of bad nature.

Noel had found himself very curt at 'breakfast' this morning, his patience wearing thin. From the washroom he had come out in his fine faun-silk robe, padding down the hallway nearly dripping towards his room, even though the maids had laid out for him a costume to wear near the tub. One that itched and poked when he wore it. He wasn't going to look like some jester in front of his subjects, so out of respite from all company he'd tossed the wardrobe into the full bath after the Eyes had left (by smoke) and made it look like an accident. He guessed that Eloquim, no doubt the overseer of the ensemble the maids had picked, assumed that Noel would be taking his time trying to get it on, for he had been down the way to his room when he spotted Eustace at Eloquim's door, with the _kage-oni _tucking something underneath his arm. Noel had tuned in his ears to listen at the wrong moment they both noticed him in, and immediately shut up their whisper chatter as soon as Noel came to be. Eustace jumped to his hooves and smiled nervously at Eloquim. "Well, Lord Silas, I will definitely request a claw-shiner for you right away!" he'd said, a little too loudly. Noel had pursed his lips. By then, the affairs between his brother and the written words had become deep too smitten, and Noel was ready to slice apart the charade before their very eyes. But he decided he'd wait for First Rising's Feast to break up the news that _he knew. _So he'd presently walked by with a thin tickle to his lips and nodded at his brother, pretending he suspected nothing, and said, "Ah, yes. Finally taking my advice and putting paint on the barn, are we, Silas?" (To his face, Noel usually used Eloquim's formal name, _Silas, _just to piss him off in a brotherly contempt.) He clapped his brother on the shoulder and looked under the hood at the bright, bloodshot green eyes of stabbing that Eloquim was giving him. He pretended not to notice. "I'm sure you'll look _dashing, _brother." And then he'd walked off to his _own _room, relaxed as a bird.

So at the First Rising's Feast that morning, or so '_breakfast_' as you call it, Noel had puckered his lips while taking a drink of wine through gentle glass, peering at his meat-devouring brother over the tuned rim. Eloquim was too focused on his food as if they were shillings to even notice he was being watched. Noel had lightly patted on his lips with his napkin, placed it on the table beside him, and asked brusquely, "Have you found yourself a pen-pal?" in the most casual manner.

Eloquim had stopped his guzzling to look up at Noel, momentarily taken off guard. "Perhaps I don't know what you mean," he gruffly grumbled, moving slowly back to gnawing on his food.

Noel had tilted back his chin, narrowing his eyes. "Perhaps you know _exactly _what I'm talking about." He stared hard at his brother, hand cupped around his wine glass's breast. "Don't play me for a fool, dear Silas; I hear the sneaking. First I quarried that it was a '_rendezvous' _you may be having with Eustace, if you know what I mean, though it seemed highly unlikely that you, such a Dancer to be taken for a lover, would go for the lowliest of servants. Only until I happened to realize that you were receiving letters from an unknown recipient did I realize that maybe your callings were a little deeper than you had ever mentioned. Tell me, _brother_"—Noel had braced his elbows on the table, lacing together his fingers below his lips—"who is it that you've been writing, and writing to so _secretly, _might I add, that you must keep it out of my vision?"

Eloquim had looked flippant over the matter, but did not meet Noel's eyes as he used his claws to peel apart a phoenix egg. "I figured not to bother you with my affairs," he sketchily grunted.

"Affairs? Oh, do _spill, _dear brother."

"I happen to know a woman," he had said after a moment. He still kept his eyes forestalled from reaching Noel's overly curious face. "I blessed it not to be of your bother and asked Eustace to keep it out of your reach. I wouldn't want you reading what she may write of me, now." This is when Eloquim met Noel's eyes, and with an intense wink did he dismantle, back to eating his food sloppily. No manners. But the wink had left Noel with a bragging chill in the back of his skull: Eloquim was lying. "I still believe you're too young to hear of what she might…_desire."_

"Ah." Noel had chuckled. He didn't let on that he knew his brother was a fake. "I'm sure that she's a fine young faun off in the Kingdom of Ferocity," he added. He pretended that was nonchalant, cutting into his own food without having to look up to see the look on his brother's face.

"Faun. Yes. As if I would inconvenience myself with one of _those."_

"Oh? Well surely she's a beauty. Whatever she is. Dare I ask?" Noel raised an eyebrow, watching his nervous brother chew slowly, mulling it over. He had kept his eyes down again. Noel brought his wine glass to his lips.

Then Eloquim had raised his head and gave a rather fang-filled, coy smile to his younger brother, a ruthless glint to his eye. He sounded all too eager to disclose details of his nonexistent 'lover', the author of all the letters he was getting. "Oh, you _may _ask. I must say she's one of a kind. Very independent. Quite the biter, too," he chuckled. "She has a determination that runs like fire through her veins. She's cunning. And has a mouth that _never _runs out of things to say—like yours, I must add. Her sarcasm is her bloodline." Eloquim had leaned back in his chair, clasping his paws behind his head, giving Noel a knowing smile. Noel frowned into his wine glass. "She's got black hair…Grey eyes…pale skin…a body that is to _die _for, too…and a little tear-shaped birthmark under her right eye. She's a very perplexing individual. A dirty dancer, too. I'd just _love_ to taste what she has to offer, you know? I'm sure she's as wicked as the _psychotic_ history she comes from. But alas…She is _worlds _away from me. It's almost like I can watch all I want, but can never touch her…"

Noel's glass had shattered in his hand. He'd been aware that his grip was becoming too tight onto the fine goblet. Shards of crystal flew through the sky, and red wine dripped down his punctured hand onto the table. The servants who waited in the room all rushed towards him with napkins, jubilant about getting his wounds tended to immediately, but Noel's fiery eyes stayed directly on his devilishly grinning brother. Eloquim rocked back in his chair and stared amusedly at Noel, enjoying the game he was stringing along around his King, toying with his heartfelt emotions. Noel swatted away the servants that were picking at him and trying to clean up the mess. _Damn demons, _he thought. _Always in the damned way. _

"Oh, yes," Eloquim said, chuckling and twisting his own glass at the thin stem. "I know _all _about _your _secret with the Eyes, and the pay you're giving him so you can spy on that hopeless Yin girl." His smile was full of yellowing, rotting dog teeth. Noel breathed hard at his own anger. _How dare he speak of Seiko like such, using her as a scapegoat for answering the real question. _"Tell me, _'dear brother,' _what do you see in her? You know that you'll never be able to see or touch her again, lest you leave the Underworld, which you know is forbidden. Unless you want to hand the throne over to _me. _I'm sure you're well aware of the rules?" Eloquim had tilted his head to the side, looking triumphant that he'd struck a note in his brother's fume. "'If the King leaves the Underworld twice, he forfeits the throne and responsibility of the Underworld onto the next heir in line for the title.'"

"The chances of _me _handing the throne over to _you _are very rare, Silas," growled Noel. His hands underneath his protective, punctured gloves started to burn.

Eloquim had shrugged, giving a flippant frown. "Your choice. I suppose that being King requires a lot of sacrifices." His smile disappeared, turning into a hard stare against Noel's face. He looked with hatred. "Including love."

"Yes," Noel agreed, "like the lack of love _you _were born from?"

Eloquim curled his lip. "Don't try to petty against me with threats about my mother."

"Your mother," Noel said back, eyes narrow, "who was a justified demonic prostitute lying in Father's bed."

Eloquim's eyes bled into their own red, fiery burn of hate. He appeared ready to stab Noel with his knife. "Need I remind you that your lovely little stalkee is no better?"

Noel had clutched both arms of his chair, knowing that his hands had already transformed into lava underneath the hexed gloves he was wearing. Noel prayed his own face looked more lethal than Eloquim's stare. The servants all watched, captivated, at the sight beholding them. "At least she _loves _her child," Noel hissed. "Your mother left you on _my _father's doorstep for him to deal with."

"And he killed _your _mother when she found out what he had done, many a Rising later."

_Crack. _The arms of the dining chair had broken. Noel was too strong for them. He jumped to his feet, kicking the chair back behind him, and waved an arm at Eloquim, giving him back the stare that they both electrified between their unbroken gaze. "_You _better watch where you step, Silas," growled Noel. "For I bathe you in no mercy."

"I shall reciprocate the same," Eloquim had ended, tone low and deadly. Noel had turned on his heel and stormed out of the dining hall, leaving behind Eloquim and his stupidity for the servants to deal with.

To say the least, Noel was having a shitty day. And having the letterkeeper parade his throne chambers was no relief.

Eustace didn't bother to care about Noel's distant, thoughtful glower into space. "Sir? Did you hear me? I said you got a letter from—"

"Shove it up your _ass, _Eustace." Noel turned to him, curling his lip. Eustace looked stunned, pulling the outstretched parchment to his chest, backing up a daisy or two. He must've been frightened greatly by the veins in Noel's face that sparked, just for that second, bright orange, showing Eustace that he meant bad by flashing him the lava in his system. "Does it look like I'm in the mood to read a poorly-written document from the _Lord of Craglings?" _

Eustace's lip bobbed. He trembled. "N-nay, sir."

Noel growled between his teeth. He whipped his head back toward the large doors at the end of the chamber. "You know, Eustace, I would kill you right now." He heard Eustace make a loud whimper. "But there isn't another demon I'd be able to find anywhere that could supply me with the things you can, so I regretfully must keep you alive."

"Thank you, s-sir."

"Oh, it isn't for _you," _Noel added, throwing a glance out the corner of his eye. "It would be for _me, _and my laziness to search for another demon capable of what _you _can do. Keep that in mind before you go and dance around the edges with Eloquim again. Speaking of which, you bothersome _toad," _he whirled in his chair to face Eustace again, a flea who cowered in fear, his two antennae quivering atop his curly mop head. "Who is it that Silas is speaking to?"

"M-my King, he has asked me not to—"

"I am your _King!" _Noel stood up abruptly, his shout scaring the already-frightened letterkeeper into jumping. He reached out his hand and curled it dangerously around Eustace's throat. The frail thing whimpered as Noel leaned in close, baring his teeth for the little traitor."You must obey _me. _And I say _tell me who he is writing to." _

Eustace's eyes were wide, glacé with a thousand black octagons, and nothing could shake him but the yell of his King into his hairy face. Eustace squealed like a pig. "All I know is it's a-a man by the n-name of Elomne, and he comes from the Upperworld," stuttered the insect hybrid. Noel narrowed his eyes. He remembered off a couple of occasions Eloquim's mention of his second in command over the Shadow Dancers, a creep by the name of Elomne von Teufel, where the name rang a bell somewhere else in his memory but wasn't close enough to recall. It seemed almost sensible that Eloquim would be keeping tabs on his worthless little militia in the Upperworld, except that Noel had the feeling that it wasn't just a simple check in and hello that Eloquim was writing for. Was Elomne now leader of the Shadow Dancers now that Eloquim _and _Kaos were no longer in lead?

Noel, hand still tight around Eustace's throat, drug him closer so they were almost nose-to-nose. "Listen to me," he expectorated through his teeth. "By sneaking around under your King's nose, you have committed a felony chargeable by prosecution." Eustace made a sound, terrified. "I could sentence you to life in the Torture Chambers for more than three-thousand Risings," he continued, making Eustace grow paler in the furry cheeks by gulps. Any smart man would be afraid of the castle's Torture Chambers, located underneath the foundation in cells that were filled with torturous toys and mechanisms used only for making someone regret breaking the laws in spite of their King. The chambers were located just off of where Noel had kept Seiko and Lloyd locked up when they had paid _their _visit to the Underworld. "I could make you suffer for_ever _until you couldn't feel your own heartbeat anymore. But nonetheless, I have a bargain to deal. In exchange for a veto to your punishment, you will be my spy."

"S-spy?" repeated Eustace. He worried.

"Yes, my _spy. _The next time that Silas gets a letter from this Elomne, you bring it _straight _to me first, without saying a word to Silas about it. You will not so much as _breathe _on it without bringing it to me." Noel loosened his grip a bit. "Keep in mind that I'm feeling a little _generous _right now, and want to know what my brother is up to more than I want to torture you—passionately, mind you. I would keep my mouth shut about this, Eustace, and if you dare say _anything _about it to Silas, I _will _carry out your sentence, and _much, much more." _Noel threw the insect man to the side, letting him fall to his rump without caring whether or not he got a booboo. He clenched his fists. Eustace's reflective eyes washed over Noel with a new fear for the violence that Noel hadn't before showed him personally, until this scoundrel betrayed law. "You are a _traitor, _and now you must pay for your sin." Noel reminded him. He pointed a long finger down on him. Eustace jumped. _What a pussy._ "Bring to me the letter he next receives, or you will regret _ever _conspiring with him in the first place."

_I _will _find out what my brother is up to, _Noel flexed his jaw. Eustace nodded and scampered off, leaving the discarded letter from the Lord of Craglings mantled over the floor, using his tiny wings to carry him out of the throne chambers quickly. Noel let his eyes fall to the paper without much interest. _I know you're hiding something big, Eloquim. But all I need to know now is: _What_? _

In good time, Noel would find out. When the next letter arrived he'd get his answer. It was that simple. All he had to do now was wait.

_But_, patience was never really his best virtue.

This would be a loooonnnggg wait.

* * *

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***BFQ **(for those interested)**: Will Noel's plan against Eloquim work? Or will it fail when something goes horribly wrong?**

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